The Lady of Night
by Beth Abelseth
Summary: Sequel to "The Walls Crumble and Fall" Jareth and Sarah are engaged, but their relationship becomes troubled when Sarah's step-father wishes his nephew away. Meanwhile a woman with great power claims that an old prophecy to destroy the labyrinth is hers.
1. Chapter 1

_Author's note: In my head, Jareth and Jeremy are both played by Johnny Depp, and Sarah and Linda are both played by Anne Hathaway, not that it matters too much who plays the parts. I just think it's better if Jareth/Jeremy and Sarah/Linda are played by the same actor and actress. It makes this scene oh so much more awesome._

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**Chapter One: "I do"**

The bride and groom stood together at the front of the vast room, holding hands, looking deeply into each other's eyes. Her dark brown hair was pulled up and away from her face, laced with white flowers and silver ribbons. His blond hair sparkled in the sunlight as he stared down into her wide gray eyes. Her long, elegant white dress had lace cap sleeves and a layer of flowery lace over fine white satin that cascaded from a seem just under her bust all the way down her form and trailed out behind her. His dark suit gleamed in contrast and beautifully set off his pale skin tone.

"Do you," the marriage commissioner had finally come to the end of her long speech, "Jeremy Smith, hereby take Linda Williams to be your lawfully wedded wife?"

"I do." Jeremy answered solemnly, squeezing Linda's hand.

"And do you," the marriage commissioner's voice rolled on, "Linda Williams, hereby take Jeremy Smith to be your lawfully wedded husband?"

Linda swallowed to keep her voice from breaking, "I do."

"The couple will now exchange rings."

"Jareth!" Sarah hissed from her front-row seat, "put that away!"

"It's not making any noise!" Jareth hissed back, snuffing the crystal into nonexistence as if it were a candle flame.

"Shh! This is important!" She glared at him briefly before turning back to her mother's wedding.

"I now pronounce you husband and wife. You may kiss the bride."

The room cheered. Sarah sighed. Jareth slumped. Then the piano kicked into a reprisal of the wedding march and the happy couple marched back down the aisle to all manner of applause and cheering. Sarah grabbed Jareth's arm and followed everyone else through the doors on the side of the chapel into the large dining room and took their places at the head table. Sarah's father, his wife, and Sarah's little half-brother Toby managed to shuffle their way over first.

Just as Sarah and Jareth were seated, Jeremy's sister, Tiffany, pressed her way through the milling throng, dragging a small boy by the elbow. "No, Brian!" She stated firmly for what sounded like the fourth time, "we are not going home!" When they reached the table, Tiffany picked Brian up and tried to cuddle him, but he only squirmed and wailed in her grip.

Jareth stood. "May I?"

"If you think you can get him to shut up!" Tiffany gave him a desperate look and handed the child over, before plopping down into a chair.

"Here, Brian. How about this?" He held the boy upside down by his feet.

At first, Brian only screamed louder. Then Jareth began to sway the boy gently side to side, and Brian gradually stopped screaming and started trying to look up at Jareth.

The Goblin King smiled and carefully flipped the child over so that he was right-side-up again. "There, now. Feel better?"

Brian stared at the Goblin King's mismatched eyes. He was wearing a very normal-looking gray dress suit with a navy tie and black dress shoes. His hair, however, was just as blond as it always was, and just as crazy. Brian reached out and grabbed a long strand of yellow hair, and pulled.

"Ow!" Jareth's face contorted momentarily. "Let go, Brian," he was working hard to keep from shouting at the child.

"Here," Sarah stood up then and gently, but firmly disentangled Brian's hand from Jareth's hair. "Hey, Brian." She smiled at the baby and then made a face.

Brian giggled.

Then the room erupted into cheering and Jareth and Sarah watched Brian's face crumple into a frown that was about to become more screaming, until Jeremy swept onto the scene and easily lifted the baby from Jareth's arms, twirling him around. Within seconds, Brian's bell-like laughter was dancing through the air.

"Oh, he's so good with children," Sarah heard her mother's voice sighing wistfully.

"Mom!" She turned and gave her mother an enormous hug. "Oh, you guys are so perfect together! And your dress is gorgeous!" Sarah herself was wearing a sparkling dark blue spaghetti strap evening gown.

"Thank you, sweetheart!" Linda released her daughter and turned to the man standing next to her, "and you must be the ever-elusive Jareth! I've heard so much about you."

The Goblin King cleared his throat. "Uh, yes, congratulations." He stuck out his hand, but Linda wrapped him into a hug he could not escape.

"Sarah!" Jeremy returned to her side of the table, having deposited Brian into his mother's lap. "It's so good to see you!" He hugged her hard and then turned to Jareth just as Linda let him go. "And you must be Jareth! Pleased to meet you. So glad you could make it! I know spring is a busy time for accountants."

"Uh, yes." Jareth shook Jeremy's hand firmly despite the confusion leaping within him. "But this is a big occasion." He smiled politely.

"Pf, I don't know about big." Jeremy waved an arm out at the guests, some of whom were still finding their seats. "It's barely a hundred people all together."

"Our original list was 300 strong." Linda winked and tugged on her husband's sleeve to get him to sit down with her.

Jareth and Sarah also sat down. Polite conversation continued throughout dinner, interrupted once or twice by the occasional speech and several times by either a squalling Brian or a dreadfully bored and mischievous Toby, who had just celebrated his fourth birthday a few weeks prior to the wedding. Every now and then, Sarah would catch Jareth trying to sneak a peek at a crystal he was holding under the table and she would elbow him in the ribs or kick him in the shin to get him to stop.

At length, the food was consumed and the music began to play. After Linda and Jeremy had spun and swayed in the traditional first dances, Jareth and Sarah joined them on the dance floor with a number of other couples, taking their turns to dance with the bride and groom.

"You seem tense," Sarah noted as she swayed in Jareth's arms.

"Hm? Oh, it's just the city." He grumbled.

"Will you please stop thinking about that for more than two seconds?" Sarah demanded wearily. "This is my mother's wedding!"

"I know. I'm sorry." Jareth fell silent for a moment, thinking about the ceremony and the many conversations he'd listened to and participated in. "You told them I was an accountant?"

"Yes." Sarah grinned. "For some big advertising corporation."

Jareth raised an eyebrow. "An accountant?"

"Well I couldn't very well tell them you were King of the Goblins, could I?"

"You could at least have said I was the king of something." Jareth griped.

"Well, you're the king of numbers." Sarah told him with a grin.

Jareth glared at her and Sarah's smile faded.

"Sorry." She muttered. "It was just a joke."

Jareth sighed and frowned at the air above Sarah's head.

"Don't worry." She insisted softly, "it's the labyrinth. What could possibly happen that you would need to be there for?"

Jareth gave her an unbelieving look. "Oh, I don't know. The bog of eternal stench could explode. The fireys could start wreaking havoc among the rubbish people. The labyrinth could decide we've been gone too long and send an earthquake to destroy the city."

Sarah rolled her eyes at him. "Stop being so dramatic."

"Alright," the Goblin King gave in with a shrug, "but if the city's in ruins when we get back, I'm blaming you."


	2. Chapter 2

**Chapter Two: The Wish**

"Thank you so much, Jeremy!" Tiffany said for the tenth time as her older brother walked her to the front door of his apartment.

"Anytime, Tiff." He shifted Brian so that the boy was on his hip and he could peck his sister on the cheek. "Have a good time tonight, you two!"

"Thanks, hon!" Linda gave him a hug and a kiss on the lips, then gave Brian a tickle. "Okay, Tiffany, if we don't go now, we're going to be late."

"Okay – do you have any questions, Jeremy?" She asked through the doorway as Linda yanked her outside by the wrist. "Linda! It's just a matinée!"

"It'll be fine, Tiff!" Jeremy promised and closed the door behind her. "Alright, little buddy, it's a guy's night in! What are we going to do first?"

Brian's face had already crumpled into the scowl before the storm.

"Uh-oh." Jeremy immediately carried him into the bedroom, where Tiffany had left her bag of baby supplies. "Don't cry, Brian," he cooed in a gentle voice, "it's alright, mommy's going to be right back! Here, you want your rattle?" He held up a brightly colored plastic toy and shook it at the frowning baby.

Then the dam broke and Brian started screaming.

***

Jareth and Sarah were sitting together under their favorite peach tree in the late afternoon, Jareth leaning his back against the tree and Sarah leaning her back against his chest while Jareth wrapped his arms around her. The goblin council had gone from after breakfast up to lunch and the petty court hearings had lasted until well into the afternoon. The Goblin King and Queen had retreated to the castle gardens immediately after.

"Dinner will be soon," Jareth sighed.

"Oh, no more goblins!" Sarah groaned, touching one hand to her forehead.

Jareth raised an eyebrow. "That's new. You usually can't get enough of the goblins."

Sarah sighed. "It's not the goblins. It's the ruling part that's so tiring."

"So tiring that you can't stand to eat dinner with them?" The Goblin King asked his fiancée, whispering softly in her ear.

A pleasant shiver ran down Sarah's spine. "Mmm, oh I guess I can go have dinner. As long as no one brings up that quarrel about who owned that stupid pig, I think I can handle it."

"Oh, I don't think that will be a problem." He stood and helped his queen to stand as well. "Charbroiling the pig with a flash of magic and serving it to the two goblins seemed to settle the matter quite definitively. I didn't know you had it in you." He smiled down at her as they walked hand in hand back to the door into the castle.

Sarah shrugged. "I just can't stand people acting like...like..."

"Like goblins?" the king suggested.

"No, like spoiled children." She retorted with a sharp glare in Jareth's direction. "They were squabbling worse than Toby's playmates do in preschool."

Jareth knew well of Sarah's habit of staring into a crystal he'd given her back when she'd first returned to the labyrinth. She would watch the lives of her family as they unfolded and make phone calls at just the right moment and sometimes even give just the right advice, or be there to listen at just the right time.

He opened the door to the dining hall, where some of the city goblins had already seated themselves and started eating the enchanted food that appeared on enchanted silver plates, and drinking enchanted drinks that filled enchanted goblets. The Goblin King and Queen entered with smiles on their faces and took their place at the head of the long wooden table.

Just when Sarah had begun to sip on her after-dinner goblet of water, all the goblins in the room fell silent, eyes shut, ears up.

"Oh, no." The Goblin King dropped his head into his hands.

Sarah leaned back in her chair and took a very deep breath, knowing that her day was about to get much longer than it already had been.

***

Brian stopped squalling long enough for Jeremy to tell him a story about goblins and how the Goblin King stole a baby and the baby's older sister went to get the baby back, but as soon as he finished Brian frowned and began wailing once again. Jeremy hoisted the boy and tossed him and swung him and cuddled him and bumped him, but nothing worked. He talked, he sang, he tried to tell another story. The baby's diaper was empty and he refused to eat anything.

Finaly, Jeremy laid the screaming child on his bed and mumbled into the blanket, "I with the goblins would come and take you away." Brian let out a particularly loud scream and Jeremy added with a wail of his own, "now, before I completely lost my hearing!"

Outside, a roll of thunder growled across the sky and Jeremy heard the clouds disclose their contents through the open bedroom window. Jeremy hefted himself off the bed and went to shut the window. As soon as it was closed, Jeremy noticed the silence.

"Brian?" He turned around slowly and looked carefully all over the bed, under the blanket, and on the floor. "Brian?" His voice a little louder, his throat a little tight, "Brian!" He left the bedroom and checked the hall, the living room, the kitchenette. "Brian!" The front door was still closed and locked.

Scratching his head, Jeremy came back into the bedroom, only to find that a tall man wearing an outfit out of a renaissance fair was standing by the window. "Who are you?" Jeremy demanded in the darkness.

"You know who I am." The man announced imperiously. "You told the boy a story about me just a moment ago, didn't you?"

"What are you – the goblin story?" Jeremy slapped a hand to his forehead. "I made that up on the spot! There are no goblins, and there is no Goblin King!"

Jareth stepped forward, plucking a crystal out of the air and twirling it in front of Jeremy's face. "I would be careful with your tongue if I were you, Jeremy Smith."

"How do you know my name?" The actor stood rigid. "Where's Brian?"

"You know where he is." The Goblin King chided, pulling the crystal back toward him.

"No, no that's not possible." Jeremy forced his body to move, waving his hands in front of him in a negating gesture. "It was just a story. I made it up myself!"

"Then I suppose," Jareth responded, turning a little away from the other man, "that I am just a figment of your imagination, and therefore have no power to do anything, in which case, I suppose I may as well leave and not waste your time."

"No!" Jeremy put a hand on the Goblin King's shoulder, "I want my nephew back. Give him back to me now!"

Jareth smiled and tossed the crystal straight up in air. "That's more like it."


	3. Chapter 3

**Chapter Three: Breaking the Rules**

Sarah lifted the little boy from the arms of a large hunch-backed goblin and cuddled him and sang to him until he fell asleep, so near to sleep herself, she didn't even hear her fiancé return.

"Sarah," Jareth gently placed his hands on her shoulders, approaching her from behind.

The Goblin Queen emitted a small gasp and jumped slightly. "Oh! Jareth. I'm sorry, I think I almost put myself to sleep."

The Goblin King smiled and took the boy from her. "You should go sleep. I can take care of this."

Sarah leaned against his arm, watching the child sleep, "but I'm the Goblin Queen. I have a responsibility just as much as you do."

"It's alright, Sarah," Jareth assured her, "I did this by myself for a long time before you came along. Go get some rest. You need it."

"So do you." The Goblin Queen closed her eyes and took in a deep breath of his musky cologne.

Jareth sighed. "Then at least come and sit down." He led her to her throne and sat down beside her.

"What's his name?" She asked, resting her chin on her arm, which was laid across the side of the throne.

"Hm?" He watched her reach out her other hand and stroke the little boy's yellow hair.

"The baby," Sarah yawned. "What's his name?"

"Oh, uh, I didn't catch it this time." He reached out his own hand to brush the side of her face with his thumb. "You should sleep, Sarah. It's been a long day."

She waved his hand away. "Who's coming for him?"

"An uncle." Jareth settled deeper into his throne.

"Aren't you going to watch him?" Sarah yawned again.

"Watch who?" The Goblin King asked petulantly.

"The baby's uncle." The Goblin Queen clarified, too sleepy to be annoyed by her finance's tone.

"Oh. Well, he seems resourceful. I'm sure he'll find his way."

Sarah sat up a little straighter. "That's not like you, Jareth. You're always watching the people who come after their children."

He shrugged. "I'm tired."

"You'd never be that tired." Suddenly, the woman vanished.

Jareth sighed deeply and murmured to the boy, "she's not going to take this well at all, is she, Brian?"

Sarah returned then, staring into her own crystal. "Jareth! That looks just like Jeremy!" She stared at him and looked at the baby in his arms. "Jareth! Is that..."

"Yes, Sarah," He answered tiredly, "it is Brian. And that is Jeremy."

"Jareth!" By the tone in her voice, he knew that she was fully awake and ready to argue. "You can't just-you have to give him back! This is Brian! And Jeremy! And my mother! Jareth! How could you?"

The Goblin King rolled his eyes. "Sarah, he made the wish. The goblins took the baby. He almost didn't even believe that I am the Goblin King. It was all I could do to get him to demand the baby back."

"So give Brian back!" Sarah demanded, a little too loudly.

Brian squirmed in Jareth's arms and he stood up to rock the child. "I can't. I can't go against the wish that boldly. He has to prove himself."

"Prove himself to whom?" The Goblin Queen demanded, crossing her arms over her chest.

"The labyrinth." Jareth hissed.

Sarah stared at him.

The Goblin King sighed. "Our power comes from the labyrinth and is ruled by the labyrinth. When he proves himself to the labyrinth, then we will be allowed to give him back the child."

"Allowed?" Sarah gaped. "Allowed! What if I just take the baby and vanish myself to wherever he is and give him back?"

"You have no idea what that would do!" Jareth took a step back from her, holding the boy closer to his chest.

"Oh, yes I do!" She stepped toward him with her arms open. "It would send them both home and then I could get some damn sleep!"

"I told you to go to sleep as soon as I came back!" The Goblin King growled as quietly as he could.

"Because you didn't want me to know that Jeremy and Brian were the ones involved this time!" As she advanced on him, he retreated behind the thrones.

"Because I knew you would react just like this! Will you please give me a chance to explain the rules?"

"Jareth, I am tired, and this is about my family! I'm not interested in explanations! And I don't care about your stupid rules!"

"They're not my rules, Sarah! If you just take the child to him, you will weaken our power and the power of the labyrinth. It would be like breaking the law of gravity."

Sarah stopped chasing him around the thrones and forced her tired brain to function. "What?"

Jareth watched her carefully. "If you broke the law of gravity, there would be nothing left to hold the earth together. It's the same with magic. The magic starts to break down and then you don't want to see what wakes up."

The Goblin Queen pressed her fingertips against her temple. "What wakes up when you break the rules, Jareth?"

"Darkness," the Goblin King whispered, "shadows. A power that does not have rules."

"That doesn't sound half bad." Sarah admitted, swaying on her feet.

"You need to sleep, Sarah. You're exhausted. I can handle the baby."

Sarah shook her head. "No. You never give the searcher enough of a chance. There have been – what, ten? – since I came here. Only two of them have succeeded, because you wouldn't intervene."

Jareth took a very deep breath. _I've become more patient than I ever thought possible_, he realized, _and she's still so difficult to deal with!_ "You know well that you were the first who succeeded when I was doing this by myself. Those statistics are through the roof, considering the track record. You know I can't intervene."

"Well, maybe I can." Sarah took her own deep breath, stowing her crystal safely into a pouch hanging from the brown belt wrapped around her waist, over the dark green dress with off-the-soulder sleeves. Then she vanished.

"Sarah," Jareth whispered as he closed his eyes, "you don't know what you've done."


	4. Chapter 4

**Chapter Four: A New Journey Begins**

A sluggish breeze crawled through the pitch-black chamber, trembling as though it were afraid. The shadows stirred, stretching themselves thin in the solid darkness. Their ends tingled with feeling. They knew they were waking, that their long dormancy was nearly at an end. The shadows didn't keep time, so they didn't know how many hundreds of years they'd been asleep. They only knew that they were waking.

***

Jeremy tripped on a rock and fell against the wall he was following. He leaned against it for a while, breathing slowly. _There has to be a way in,_ he told himself, _the wall can't go on forever._ He stood and began to continue, but stopped short when he found himself staring down at a dark-haired, pale-skinned woman in a long green renaissance-fair-dress.

"Who're you?" He asked quickly.

"Jeremy, it's me." A familiar voice answered as the moon rose higher. "Sarah."

Jeremy blinked, squinted, and bent lower to get a better look at her face. "Sarah? What are you doing here?"

She took a deep breath and considered saying several things. "I'm here to help."

Something deep within the ground rumbled.

"What was that?" Jeremy demanded, looking all around him.

"It's nothing." Sarah promised. "Come here." She reached out and grasped his arm. "I'm going to fix this." She closed her eyes and concentrated.

"Um, Sarah?" Jeremy coughed. "What are you doing?"

The Goblin Queen opened her eyes and looked around. They were still standing outside the wall of the labyrinth. "Why didn't it work?" She took her crystal out of her pouch and focused on Jareth, but it remained dark and empty. "What's wrong?" She whispered to herself.

"I lost Brian, that's what's wrong." Jeremy took his arm back and covered his face with his hands. "Tiffany is going to kill me."

"No! Jeremy! This is not your fault!" Sarah reached up and moved his hands away from his face. "Look. I'm here to help you."

"The Goblin King said that Brian was in the castle beyond the goblin city, but I can't even get into the labyrinth around the goblin city!" His hands balled into fists.

"It's okay." Sarah tried to comfort him, going to the wall and placing a hand on it, "I couldn't find the way in on my own, either." She started to walk forward, trailing her hand along the bricks.

"What do you mean, either?" Jeremy asked as he followed her.

So, Sarah told him all about her first adventure into the labyrinth to save Toby. It helped to pass the time, and just as she finished, her fingers stopped rubbing the wall and fell into space. "Oh!" Sarah yelped, and immediately turned to step into the opening, "I found one!"

"One what?" Jeremy inquired, going into the labyrinth behind her.

"An entrance into the labyrinth." Sarah smiled to herself, looking down either end of the passage she was now standing in. "Things are not always what they seem around here."

"Yeah." Jeremy agreed with a yawn, "I'd believe that."

Sarah herself had to stifle a yawn and looked around more carefully with bleary eyes. "Oh, no," she murmured, "not the mist!"

"The what?" Her step-father was leaning against the nearest wall.

"Don't go to sleep!" Sarah grabbed his arm and dragged him away from the wall, setting off down the corridor at a jog. "Stay awake, Jeremy!"

"Why?" He said through an enormous yawn.

"Because if you fall asleep here, you'll stay asleep forever!"

***

Jareth stared into the crystal, fighting heavy eyelids. "I'm so sorry, Sarah. The labyrinth is just doing what it has to do to protect itself, and everyone who lives within it, including us."

"Sire?" Middleweed bowed before her king.

"Yes?" Jareth glanced up from the crystal momentarily to acknowledge the goblin woman's presence.

"The baby's asleep and safe in the crib, sire." Her purple horns glowed slightly in the candlelit room. "And all the city goblins have cleared out of the castle."

"And the castle goblins?" Jareth asked while looking into the clear bauble.

"They've all gone to bed, sire."

"All but one," the Goblin King corrected her, with another glance up, "and she should also turn in."

"Yes, sire, but," Middleweed hesitated, but only for a moment, "I had planned to stay up with the child."

Jareth smiled. "Yes, if that's what you want. But take a blanket or something with you."

"Yes, sire!" Middleweed bowed hurriedly and scuttled through the door.

The Goblin King's smile faded. "Run, Sarah," he whispered. "I can't do anything for you this time. You've broken the rules. Not even the labyrinth can help you."


	5. Chapter 5

**Chapter Five: The Wall Monster**

Sarah burst through the edge of the mist and tripped over something she couldn't see. Jeremy toppled down with her and they lay on the ground, huffing and puffing.

"That's so weird," Jeremy mumbled as he rolled over and started to get up, "I feel so awake now."

Sarah closed and opened her eyes slowly. "The labyrinth is like that." Then she also got up and continued walking along the bricks, trailing her hand on the right-side wall. "If you keep your hand on the other wall, then maybe one of us will find another opening."

Jeremy glanced at the left-side wall and then followed Sarah, doing as she said. "Do you remember the way through?"

Sarah shook her head. "There is no one specific way through. The labyrinth changes every minute. We'd never be able to find the way I went before, let alone follow along it like it was just some trail on a map." She sighed. "We're going to have to make a new way through."

Jeremy's shoulders slumped. "I have to get Brian back. He must be so scared."

"Actually, he's being very well cared-for," Sarah answered sharply, without thinking.

"How do you know?" The boy's uncle demanded just as sharply.

Sarah sighed. "Because I know. Please don't ask me to explain it. Brian is fine, and he's being taken care of, so don't worry about it. Just focus on getting through the labyrinth."

"You want me to relax?" Jeremy shouted. "I can't just relax! This is my sister's son, we're talking about here!"

Sarah whirled on him. "You think I'm having a fun time of things right now?" She stepped toward him, imposing and admonishing as if he were just a goblin who was being too stupid for Sarah's patience. "I was all set to enjoy an after-dinner walk in the garden and then go to bed early, because I have had a very long day! And then, what happens? Some stupid mortal gets it into his stupid head to wish that his stupid nephew would be taken by goblins!"

"I didn't think anything was going to happen!" Jeremy stared at her with wide eyes, unfamiliar with her temper. "I didn't mean it!"

"Well if you didn't want it to happen," Sarah informed him in a low, level tone, "you shouldn't have wished..." her sentenced trailed off unfinished and her shoulders slumped, "oh no!" She kicked out at the nearest wall. "I sound just like him!"

"Just like who?" Jeremy took a few steps back and away from his step-daughter.

"Jareth, the Goblin King." Sarah groaned. "Oh! I'm mad at him! I don't want to talk like him!"

"Wait a minute. Are you telling me that Jareth, your fiancé, is the same guy who stole Brian?"

Sarah stared at Jeremy, and decided to choose her words carefully. "Technically, the goblins are the ones who took Brian, and technically, you're the one who wished him away, so really, Jareth didn't steal anything. He went to give you a chance to get Brian back." _It's your own fault for making the wish_, she added bitterly in her head.

Jeremy's eyes grew wide as he stared at her, "Sarah..." He stepped back until he hit the other wall.

"What?" She put her hands on her hips. "Don't look at me like that-"

"I'm not looking at you."

Sarah turned around slowly, eyebrows drawing together.

The bricks in the wall behind her were shifting and rolling over one another, removing themselves from the rest of the wall and arranging themselves into the shape of a fifteen-foot-tall humanoid creature. Two bricks stuck out in its head and the creature scanned the area with these, tilting its head in every direction, until it found the little humans standing before it.

"Damn!" Sarah cursed as she turned and grabbed Jeremy by the wrist to yank him back down the way they'd come. _If only I hadn't lost my powers!_ She stopped her sprint short when she came upon the sleeping mist. "We can't go back." Sarah turned to face the brick creature. "I don't think bricks can fall asleep anyway."

"Then we have to get past it." Jeremy surmised, sizing up the creature. "Somehow."

"It might not be so hard," Sarah mused, watching the brick creature lumber up to them, then stop to stare down at them with is brick eyes. "It's legs are really long. We might be able to dash past."

The creature swung an arm down toward them and Jeremy and Sarah ducked and rolled in separate directions. "Now!" Sarah shouted, and leaped to her feet.

Jeremy was on her heels through the creature's legs and as they pulled into the open corridor, he soon took the lead. Sarah glanced over her shoulder to see the brick creature fold in on itself, bricks grinding against bricks, until it became an enormous brick ball, which rolled after them at speed. Her head whipped back around to face forward.

"There!" Jeremy shouted, pointing off to the left. "A turn!"

"Go!" Sarah yelled and hardly slowed down to take the turn herself.

They kept running even as they heard the brick ball crash past the opening. Jeremy looked back to see the brick creature standing high above the walls. It lifted one long, long leg, and stepped over the nearest brick wall.

***

Jareth scowled into the crystal, pacing back and forth in front of his throne in the empty room. "There is no brick creature in the labyrinth," he muttered to himself. "I would know if there was. Something's wrong." He stopped and stared at the doorway that led out of the throne room, hauling old memories out of the recesses of his mind. "I'm sorry, Sarah." The crystal vanished. "Middleweed will have to take care of Brian." With that, he closed his eyes, and was gone from the throne room.


	6. Chapter 6

**Chapter Six: Q & A**

Jareth opened his eyes to darkness and waved a hand. A dozen stubs of candle came to life, swathing the oubliette in yellow light and brown shadows, which twitched under Jareth's glare. He found the door propped against a wall. He removed it and cleared a space in the middle of the floor. Then he dropped it flat on the concrete and bent down to pull it open. He sat down and swung his feet over the edge, into the emptiness beyond. He closed his eyes for just a moment, grabbed the edge of the door, and shoved himself into the pit, pulling the door closed behind him.

***

Sarah and Jeremy ran into a dead end, breathing heavily, sweat trailing down their backs. They turned just in time to see the brick monster catching up with them.

"No!" Jeremy wailed, "this can't be it! I have to save Brian!"

Sarah swallowed down the lump in her throat. "I'm sorry about Brian," she whispered, "and I'm sorry I was angry at Jareth, and I'm sorry I broke the rules..."

Jeremy backed up against the wall as well, leaning on it with Sarah, watching the brick monster approach them. Suddenly, the wall behind them tilted down and the ground beneath their feet tilted back, and Jeremy and Sarah fell into the dark space beyond.

With a whump, they found themselves on a pile of old wooden swords, frayed capes, thick blankets, and broken crates. A dozen candle stubs were lit around the room, so they were not in utter darkness when the floor and wall tilted back to their rightful place, sealing Sarah and Jeremy in.

The Goblin Queen breathed a sigh of relief and rolled off the blanket she'd landed on so that her face was against the floor. "Thank you," she whispered to the Labyrinth. "Would it be too much to hope for my powers back?" She sat up painfully and took the crystal out of her pocket. "Jareth," she whispered.

The light within the crystal bent and contorted for a moment, but then there was only darkness. Sarah frowned at it. _Either I don't have my powers back, or Jareth is in a place where there is no light._

"Ow." Jeremy stood up and rested his hands on the small of his back. "What was that anyway?"

"What was what?" Sarah asked, stowing the crystal back in her pouch as she got to her feet. _I can't just whisk him off to the castle,_ she thought to herself. _That would break the rules and get my powers taken away again - if I even have them back now._

"What I landed on," he squinted down at the ground. "It almost looks like a doorknob."

Sarah walked over to him and lifted the door off the ground. "Good job, Jeremy. You found exactly what we needed." She smiled at him.

"We needed a door?" He asked, skeptically.

"Yes. This is the oubliette." Sarah marched over to an empty space of wall. "The tunnels around us are dangerous, but they're the only way out that I know of." _Still, I don't think there's a rule against me traveling with him._

"Ah," Jeremy watched her prop the door against the wall and pull it open. "Um, Sarah, how many times have you been in this oubliette thing?"

"Um," Sarah tried to count in her head while checking down each direction of the tunnel, "I think this would be the third time." She stepped out into the dimly lit area, looking up at the moonlight that spilled through a grate in the ceiling.

"How many times have you been here, to the labyrinth?" Jeremy asked quietly as he walked cautiously through the doorway.

"Well, I was only brought here twice because of a wish," she answered hesitantly, turning to the left and walking forward.

"Uh-huh." Jeremy caught up and walked beside her, matching his steps to hers. "And how long have you known Jareth?"

"Well, we met the first time when I was in high school, so I guess it's been a long time." Her eyes darted side to side, trying to watch every part of the tunnel at once.

"Did you know he was the Goblin King when he asked you to marry him?" Jeremy's voice was low and level.

"I don't think it really matters what he does for a living," Sarah's response was stiff. "He loves me. And I love him."

"Sarah!" Jeremy stepped in front of her and grabbed her by the shoulders. "Do you know what you're doing? You'll be trapped down here for the rest of your life!"

The Goblin Queen sighed heavily. _Well, it was going to come out sometime_, she told herself. "Do you mind if we walk while we have this discussion? There are a lot of dangerous things in these tunnels and the longer we stand here, the more danger we're in."

"Only if you promise to answer every question truthfully." Jeremy stepped aside and they continued forward.

"Of course." Sarah sighed again. "I've actually been living here for three years now, and if you've noticed, I've come to visit home once a year for several weeks at a time each, and then I made a special trip with Jareth to your wedding just a little while ago. So it's not like I'll be trapped with no way out. In fact, if I wanted to, I could leave and never come back. Jareth's made that very clear."

"Then why do you stay?" Jeremy ran a hand through his blond hair. "What happened to college and acting and – and your whole life?"

Sarah smiled. "This is my life. I like ruling the goblins with Jareth, and you don't need a college degree down here. You don't even need a high school diploma, really. I love my life here, even if Jareth and I have a fight every now and then. Every day is an adventure."

"But that's the way life is on earth, too!" Jeremy protested. "There are adventures everywhere you look! Watching Brian, for example, now that's an adventure unto itself."

Sarah laughed. "Yes, but you don't have goblins on earth, do you?"

"Why would you want goblins in your life anyway?"

She shrugged. "They make me laugh."

"People can make you laugh, too, Sarah." Jeremy reminded her in a fatherly tone. "You can't just throw your life away for some fancy-dressed rock-star goblin!"

The Goblin Queen scowled. "I'm not throwing my life away, and he's not a goblin. He's a human."

"Then how did he get to be the king of the goblins?" Jeremy demanded.

"Long story," Sarah told him through gritted teeth, her steps speeding up as they went.

"And what about you? I suppose you're going to be the Goblin Queen?"

"I already am." Sarah admitted with a flip of her hair. "The goblins named me that on my second day here."

"And you and Jareth," Jeremy pressed, matching Sarah's quickening gait. "How close are you?"

"We're engaged. You know that."

"Uh-huh." Jeremy eyed Sarah's stomach. "You've been engaged for two years. When's the wedding supposed to be again?"

"Next summer. After I finish – or would have finished college." She glanced up at him, not stopping or slowing down. "You can't tell anyone about this, Jeremy. Everyone else thinks I'm at college. That's the whole reason we've waited so long to have the wedding. Jareth wanted to do it the same week he asked me, but I refused. I want it to be something I can invite my family to and not have them all thinking I'm getting married for any other reason besides that I've fallen in love with a truly wonderful man."

"What, you're going to bring them all here?" Jeremy waved his hands at the tunnel walls.

"No, of course not! We're going to get married in the park near Dad and Irene's house. In that cute little Japanese pagoda-thing, by the pond."

"And I suppose a goblin is going to read the vows?" Jeremy quipped.

"Actually, we'd asked the Wiseman, but you don't know him. Yet," she added thoughtfully. "Aha!" She ducked her head under a low beam and stepped into a side room. "Here we go!" She immediately began climbing the tall ladder with Jeremy close behind her.


	7. Chapter 7

**Chapter Seven: Riddling**

Jareth was very still in the void, reaching out gently with his mind to probe the darkness. It cringed away from him and molded itself around him, hissing like a pile of snakes. "They're broken," his whisper crashed into the emptiness, "the seals are broken!" _How?_ His mind raced. _They've held her for centuries! I know they were old, but why break now?_ "Sarah..." the shadows hissed louder as his voice echoed. "Oh, Sarah, what have you done?"

***

Sarah and Jeremy came up through the floor of a dead-end with three brick walls and one large, intricate black-painted iron gate. Beyond the gate, they could clearly see the beginnings of the hedge maze. Sarah took a deep breath and walked right up to the gate, studying it carefully to find where the two doors met.

"Why not just push?" Jeremy asked, reaching over her shoulder to push at the gate. "Or pull," he added when it didn't budge. His face creased into a confused frown when the gate still didn't move.

"Things aren't always what they seem." Sarah said quietly, standing straight. "How do we get into the hedge maze?"

"Mmm," the iron gate groaned, "that's a good one."

Jeremy gasped and stepped back, but Sarah only watched with a bemused grin. "Hello."

"Hello." The design in the gate reshaped itself into a face, complete with eyes, nose, and mouth. "There are many ways into the maze, but you'll never get in." It smiled mischievously.

"Why is that?" Sarah asked, looking the gate over carefully.

"Because you must first correctly guess the answer to my riddle." The gate answered with the groan of iron rubbing against iron.

"What's the riddle?" Jeremy demanded, standing tall next to Sarah.

The gate chuckled. "The bane of children, hides all things, can't be bought with gold or rings, it fills up space where things still stand, and with the light comes hand in hand."

Jeremy and Sarah stared at the gate for a few minutes in silence, running the words through their heads, forcing their brains to turn and search for the answer.

"The bane of children," Sarah murmured, "like monsters in their closets?"

"Or the absence of their parents," Jeremy muttered.

Sarah glanced quizzically at Jeremy, but then moved on, "hides everything, like a cloth? A wall? A child playing hide-and-seek?"

"Can't be bought," Jeremy continued, "means it's not a material thing, right?"

The gate shrugged as only a gate can. "No hints allowed, I'm afraid."

Sarah's brow wrinkled. "It fills up the same space where other things are, so it's definitely not material."

"Hope?" Jeremy watched Sarah's face twist with her thinking, "comes hand in hand with light?"

The gate grinned smugly. "Nope."

"Hope isn't the bane of children," Sarah said, "and it doesn't fill up space."

"So what else goes hand in hand with light?" Jeremy asked, looking back at the grinning face in the gate.

_I think I know what it is,_ Sarah thought to herself, _but if I answer the riddle, then it's like I'm doing the quest for him. If Jeremy has to earn his chance to get Brian back, just like everyone else, then me answering the riddle is probably against the rules, and won't help me get my powers back._ "Think about it, Jeremy," Sarah suggested carefully. "When someone turns on a light in a room, what do you get in the corners?"

"Cobwebs?" Jeremy guessed.

Sarah frowned and looked up at his puzzled face. "What are children afraid of when you put them to bed?"

"The monsters in the closet?" He hazarded.

Sarah's frown deepened and she looked around her in the small space in front of the gate for inspiration.

"Look, Sarah, if you know what the answer is, why don't you just tell me?"

"I don't think I can," she admitted with a huff.

"Why not?" Jeremy demanded, putting his hands on his hips.

"Because it's against the rules." The Goblin Queen looked up at her step-father.

"What rules?"

Sarah sighed, trying to remember how Jareth had explained to her. "They're like the law of gravity. If you break one, things start to fall apart. They're the rules of the Labyrinth."

Jeremy rubbed his face in his hands. "Okay, Sarah. Give me a hint."

She bit her lip and glanced at the smug expression on the gate.

"Something, please, Sarah." Jeremy folded his hands together and held them under his chin.

"Well, just think about the first part," she said carefully, "what are the banes of children?"

Jeremy blinked, "um, well besides the monsters in the closet, I guess, there would be things they could choke on, open electrical outlets, things to fall off of, things to make messes with..." his voice trailed off as he watched Sarah's expression shift. "I'm not getting anywhere close, am I?"

"Remember what you figured out before, about how it can't be bought."

"It's immaterial." Jeremy dropped his hands from their pleading gesture. "Okay, so a bane of children that you can't reach out and touch. Like monsters in the closet, but not monsters in the closet. Fear. Something their afraid of?" He searched Sarah's face for some kind of sign. "Like the dark?"

Sarah nodded her head at the gate. "Tell him. It's his riddle."

Jeremy turned to the large black iron shape, which seemed to have lost its grin. "It's the dark. Children are afraid of the dark, you can't see anything in it, you can't buy it, you can stand in the same space as it, and you always have it when there's light because light makes shadows."

"Fine," the gate grumbled and swung slowly open from one side. "I'll have to think of a better one next time."

Sarah smiled at the gate as she passed through. "I thought this one was very good. I'm sure you'll be able to come up with a really good one." She patted it gently as it closed behind her, muttering to itself.


	8. Chapter 8

**Chapter Eight: Wisdom**

The Goblin King vanished himself back to the oubliette and leaned against a wall. The candle stubs had gone out since he'd left, and the door had been moved to the wall opposite where he was standing. Through his spine, he could just barely feel the bricks vibrating. He closed his mismatched eyes and took a deep breath. "I'll find her," he whispered to the Labyrinth. "I'll trap her again...or something." _I should have just finished it before, when she was weak__,_ he thought to himself as he pushed off the wall and went to the door on the other side of the room. _Now I'm the who'll be weak. This is not going to be easy._ The Goblin King opened the door and stuck his head out to check down either direction of the tunnel beyond. _ But it has to be done._

***

"Are you sure you don't want to lead the way?" Jeremy asked as he made a decision and turned left at an intersection of tall green hedges.

"I'm not sure of anything right now," Sarah admitted wearily. Her mind had been chasing itself in circles trying to figure out what was going on. She'd tried looking into the crystal again twice as they walked, but each time it filled with darkness. _I don't know what it means_, she thought in frustration, _it's like I'm getting a busy signal. Something must be blocking the magic._

"Hey! Look!" Jeremy trotted forward, right up to a wrinkled old man with a tall oddly-shaped hat, snoring gently and sitting on an elevated chair in the middle of a square space in the hedge maze.

"The Wiseman!" Sarah yelped, following Jeremy quickly.

The Wiseman snorted and woke up, jostling the hat. "Huh?" The Wiseman grunted, "what's that?"

"Hey! Hey!" The hat squawked. "That's the Goblin Queen! How are things, your majesty?"

The Wiseman cleared his throat. "I was just getting to that."

Sarah smiled at her friends. "Hello, it's really good to see you."

"You know them?" Jeremy's stare bounced from the Wiseman to Sarah and back again.

"Yes, we met the first time I came through the Labyrinth," she explained briefly before turning back to the Wiseman, "listen, I'm really glad we stumbled into you, because I need your help."

"Very well, my lady," the Wiseman bowed his head slightly, "how may we be of service?"

Sarah launched into her explanation, speaking clearly, but too quickly for anyone to interrupt. "I lost my powers earlier when I came to help Jeremy, but I'm pretty sure that's because I broke the rules by trying to just vanish him straight to the castle instead of making him wander all the way through the Labyrinth. I apologized to the Labyrinth and I think it gave me back my powers, but whenever I try to look into my crystal and see Jareth, it just fills up with darkness. I'm afraid something might be blocking the magic, but I have no idea what, or how, or why." She took a deep breath and waited.

"Aye carumba!" The bird-hat crowed. "That is a problem!"

"Will you be quiet?" The Wiseman grumbled at thing on his head.

"Okay, fine, I can see you don't want my advice."

The Wiseman cleared his throat again. "Every choice has a consequence, and sometimes the consequences have consequences. We do not always see the results of our choices and their consequences, but always those results will come back to us."

"You break the rules," the hat added with a nod, "you pay the price."

Sarah's fists clenched. "Well maybe I wouldn't break the rules if they weren't so cruel!" She managed to keep her voice low and level, but she couldn't stop it from quivering. "You can't just go around granting every wish someone makes! Not everyone means it when they say 'I wish'! I mean, really, who means to wish their own child away? And what's so wrong with trying to help someone through the Labyrinth?"

"Sometimes," the Wiseman suggested before the hat could get a word in, "to love is to be cruel."

Sarah threw her arms up and stomped away from the Wiseman, shouting, "what is that supposed to mean? How can love have anything to with being cruel? It's not fair! None of this is fair, and I am so sick and tired of all these stupid rules that are cruel and pointless, and when I get back to castle, I am going to give Jareth a very big piece of my mi-" the square of ground beneath her feet broke and crashed away into darkness, taking Sarah with it. Her scream followed behind her.

"Sarah!" Jeremy ran to the space where she had just been standing and watched, wide-eyed as the ground knitted itself back together. "Sarah?" He prodded the patch of ground with a toe. Then he stood on it. Then he jumped on it.

"It's no use," the hat told him from where it sat on the Wiseman's head. "The Labyrinth wanted her. It won't take you."

"But..." Jeremy stared at the ground between his feet. "She's my step-daughter."

"Oh!" The hat crowed, "so you're family! That's fantastic! Will you be at the wedding?"

Jeremy shook his head and walked back up to the Wiseman, who was now snoring quietly. "Look, I need to get Brian back, and help Sarah if I can. Can you help me at all?"

The hat looked down at the Wiseman. "I don't think he heard you."

"I wasn't asking him." Jeremy glared at the hat. "I was asking you."

The hat stared at him for a minute, processing this. "No one's ever asked me what I think before."

Jeremy sighed. "Well I'm asking you now. Is there anything I can do for Sarah? And how do I get to the castle beyond the goblin city?"

"Hmmm," the bird hummed thoughtfully, "well, the Goblin Queen has lived here for a few years now, so don't worry about her. She can handle herself. As for the castle, ummm, what's the old man always saying? Oh! I remember!" The bird puffed up its feathers, and announced in as mystical a tone as it could manage, "Sometimes, the way back is actually the way forward." Its feathers flattened and it returned to using its high-pitched voice, "Or something like that. Anyway, it doesn't really matter. Either you'll find the castle or you won't, and that's about the size of it." The bird held out its little collection box. "Please leave a contribution before you go!"

Jeremy sighed heavily and ran his fingers through his yellow hair. "Yeah, thanks. I guess I just have to keep going then." He reached into his pocket and pulled out a few coins. "Here." He dropped his change into the box and then headed off back into the hedge maze.


	9. Chapter 9

**Chapter Nine: The Lady of Night**

Sarah landed on something that felt like a velvet sheet that wrapped itself around her and fell with her the last two feet to the hard ground. For a moment, she was very still, just breathing, concentrating on not crying. Then she sat up and pulled at the sheet until she was able to yank her head free.

"Where am I?" The Goblin Queen asked aloud to the emptiness around her. She saw no difference when she shut her eyes than when she opened them. _Have I gone blind?_

A woman's trilling laughter shocked Sarah to her feet.

"Who's there?" The Goblin Queen demanded of the darkness.

The shadows above her shifted and Sarah looked up and saw the moon shining down through a deep hole in the ground. A dim white light spread out around, but did not touch any walls or corners. A woman stood before her, wearing a black velvet dress with long sleeves and a low V-neck that came only to her knees, and tall black high-heeled boots that laced all the way up. Her hair was blacker than night and curled erratically around her pale face. Her eyes were so dark, Sarah was sure the irises must have been black. The woman was even wearing black lipstick.

"Who are you?" Sarah asked the woman, forcing herself not to tremble.

The woman smiled and approached the Goblin Queen, her shoes making no sound against the dark floor. "I don't have a name." Her voice was hauntingly melodic. "But the goblins liked to call me the Lady of Night."

"What are you doing here?" The Goblin Queen put on an air of confidence and authority.

The Lady of Night laughed with a sound like little cold iron bells. "I do believe that I should be the one asking you what you are doing here." She began to walk around Sarah, slowly coming closer with every step. "This is my realm, Sarah."

"How do you know my name?" Her neck twisted to keep the Lady of Night in her line of vision as she walked behind her.

"I know a great deal about you," the woman answered with a sneer, "your majesty." Her mocking smile touched something deep within Sarah's heart. "I know that you were born human, like Jareth, and that you wished yourself to the Labyrinth for ever."

"How do you know that?" Sarah could hear the confidence draining out of her own voice.

"I am the Lady of Night, my dear." The woman answered, standing directly in front her once again, only a few inches away. "I have my own power, just as Jareth has his."

"What is your power?" Sarah asked quietly, looking up at the taller woman.

"Shadows," the Lady of Night hissed, "darkness. The power to block out all light, and swath all things in black. My strength knows no bounds, and I obey no rules."

Sarah's eyes widened. "You don't have to follow any rules?"

"No." the Lady of Night answered with a sudden brightness. "It's really quite nice."

"Then why have I never met you until now?" The Goblin Queen questioned.

The Lady of Night silently glared down at Sarah for a moment. "How well do you think you know your Jareth, my dear?" Her voice was low, menacing.

"We're engaged." Sarah answered immediately.

The Lady of Night laughed her ice-cold bell-like laugh. "Let me tell you something about your precious Goblin King. He was not the first being of power to live here, in the Labyrinth. In fact, he wasn't even born with power. He had to steal it from the Labyrinth."

"What do you mean, 'steal'?" Sarah asked, taking half a step back.

"I mean that he took what was not meant for him!" The Lady of Night growled vehemently. "I should have gotten the power of the Labyrinth, Sarah. It was always meant for me!" She calmed herself a little before going on, "I was born from the shadows, already infused with their power. Jareth was just a human boy, living among the goblins. He knows nothing of true power. True power has no limitations, no rules, no endings, no beginnings. It lives and breathes and courses through you. Here," the Lady of Night put a hand on Sarah's shoulder, "let me show you."

***

Jareth was walking into deeper and deeper shadows, leaving all light behind him, following whatever trail there was. He marched forward, focused only on finding the one who had escaped, until he realized how much the ground was shaking. The Goblin King stopped walking, looked ahead of him, and then turned and looked behind. Several yards away, the ground seemed to crawl. In the dim light, it was hard to be sure, but it look as though it might be a sea of small creatures all thundering toward him.

The Goblin King watched as one of the creatures leaped into the air, a small dark lizard-like shape with a mouth full of dark, shining teeth. It snapped its jaw when it reached the peak of its jump and then fell back into the crowd.

Jareth turned and ran into the darkness.

***

The sky was filling up with heavy gray clouds, but the world was growing steadily lighter. Jeremy had found the end of the hedge maze an hour before dawn, and had stumbled on into a forest as the sun rose behind the clouds. Every now and then, through the trees, he would catch a glimpse of the castle's towers, rising high above the goblin city, and he would press on with more energy than he'd ever thought was in him.

At length, he came to an open area where a few bushes grew and bore bright orange berries. Starving, but cautious, Jeremy picked one and looked it over, trying to decide what kind of berry it was and if it was safe to eat.


	10. Chapter 10

**Chapter Ten: Power**

"Ho, sir!" A red fox galloped into the berry bush atop a white-and-gray sheepdog. "Resist temptation and do not eat the berry!"

"What?" Jerry dropped the bright orange berry and moved away from the talking animal. "Who are you?"

"I am the gallant Sir Didymus!" The fox announced, bowing while still in his saddle, "and this is Ambrosius, my trusty steed."

The dog barked and wagged his tail.

"Oh." Jeremy took another few steps back, out of the berry bush. "Why shouldn't I eat the berries?"

"These are cursed!" Sir Didymus informed him dramatically, "one taste and thou wilt spend the rest of thine life amongst these bushes, stuffing berries in thine mouth for all of time." He kicked Ambrosius' sides and came out of the berry patch himself. "If thou art hungry, I have food that I would share, if thou can prove thyself of good and honest stock?"

"Uh," Jeremy closed his eyes to help his thinking, "well, Sarah, my step-daughter is the Goblin Queen."

"The very same?" Sir Didymus whispered in shock.

"Yeah," Jeremy nodded his head, looking down at the fox and the dog. "The very same."

"Well then!" Sir Didymus turned his dog around and made for the tree-line. "Come, good sir! For thou art friend. Er, what was thy name again?"

"Jeremy."

"Friend Jeremy! Come, feast with me and my steed!"

Ambrosius barked happily.

As it turned out, 'feasting' meant eating a small pile of fruit that Sir Didymus and Ambrosius had collected earlier in the day. As they ate, Jeremy explained his adventure, how he'd discovered the truth of Sarah's relationship with Jareth and the Labyrinth, and how she had vanished through a loose tile in the hedge maze.

For a while, Sir Didymus was silent, staring at the scattered pits and cores of their meal. "It's all very strange," he finally murmured. "But I suppose it will only make sense once the babe is safely returned home." He stood them and called to Ambrosius, who'd wandered off somewhere. "I will lead thee to the doors of the castle, good Jeremy, for Sarah's sake if not thine own. After that, thou must face the Goblin King thyself, for that is how it is done. Ho, Ambrosius!" He mounted the sheepdog and started off into the forest.

"Thanks, Sir Didymus!" Jeremy got to his feet and followed the brightly colored, brightly dressed animal. "I really appreciate your help."

"I would do anything for Sarah," Sir Didymus explained softly. "There are many who would go so far as to give their lives for her, I daresay. You should have seen the place before she came. The Goblin King may have brought life to it when he discovered his magic, but the Goblin Queen, why, she brought love."

***

Sarah felt a wave of ice shoot through her bones, making her shake instantly from the cold. Her entire body felt numb, her breath frozen in her chest, her heartbeat nearly stopped.

Then it passed and Sarah fell, coughing dreadfully, to her knees. She still felt chilled, but her body felt more awake than it had for days. "What," she asked between coughs, "was that?"

The Lady of Night grinned. "That was a taste of my power. I'm going to let you try it, Sarah." She explained sweetly, "take me somewhere. Anywhere you want to go." On a whim, she added, "take me to your beloved Jareth."

_Jareth! _Sarah's heart leaped. _He'll know what to do about her._ She pictured the throne room and the darkness around them whirled for a second before they were standing in front of the empty thrones, in the empty room. "Where is he?" Sarah asked aloud, looking around the room. She reached into her pouch for her crystal, but stopped when she saw the shadows of the throne room moving toward her. "What...?"

The Lady of Night laughed under her breath, biting her lip. She watched with glee as the Goblin Queen was wrapped in shadows, writhing and twisting against them, but unable to escape. The dark shapes crawled across the floor, climbed up her ankles and all around her clothes and body, rooting her to the spot, pinning her arms at her sides, covering her mouth.

"Oh, you silly queen." The Lady of Night chided, gracefully pacing around the trapped Sarah. "What did you think was going to happen, hm? Was your precious king going to save you from the scary wicked witch?" She laughed aloud, the cold harsh melody bouncing off the walls. "Oh, dear. What will I do with you?" She stopped then, standing directly in front of the Goblin Queen, smiling into her rebellious gray eyes. "Oh! How forgetful of me! You were looking for your fiancé, weren't you?" The Lady of Night clapped her hands together in front of Sarah's face. "Well, let's find him, shall we?" When she pulled her hands apart, there was a thin web of black shadow between them.

Sarah watched the Lady of Night sneering on the other side of the web until her eyes focused on the image before her. Barely visible in the strange window was a man with crazy yellow hair, running down a dark tunnel. Behind him came an enormous herd of small black lizard-like creatures with large mouths and long, sharp teeth. He came to a dead-end and stopped, turning to face the creatures.

The Goblin Queen tried to shout to him, but could only make a muffled groaning noise against the shadow-bonds. Jareth pointed a finger into the creatures and a bolt of lightning arced out into their midst. The creatures leaped and ducked, and for a moment, there was a huge hold in the throng, but in the next second it was filled with twice as many creatures as Jareth had blasted away.

"How foolish," the Lady of Night mused, "you can't defeat darkness with light. Do you know why, Sarah?"

The Goblin Queen shook her head, feeling tears in the corners of her eyes. _This is all my fault, isn't it?_ Sarah thought wretchedly. _None of this would have happened if I hadn't tried to break Jareth's stupid rules._

"You can't defeat darkness with light," the Lady of Night explained, "because light just creates more shadows." She laughed to herself, watching happily as the creatures reached the Goblin King and swarmed all over him, each one chomping its jaws into him.

Sarah screamed into the shadow-bonds.


	11. Chapter 11

**Chapter Eleven: Jareth Waning**

It was a moment before Jareth realized the shadow lizards were gone. It was another moment before he heard her icily beautiful laughter. The Goblin King raised his eyes to the standing form of the Lady of Night.

"I would have loved to watch you suffer more," she admitted, "but your stupid wench started screaming so loud I couldn't stand it."

"Sarah!" Jareth started to get up, but his legs collapsed beneath him and he crashed to the hard stones. His ears felt filled with cotton as he examined the state of his clothes, torn and ripped everywhere, his legs and arms and stomach bleeding. The pain reached out to him as if through a cloud. He steeled himself against the protest of his body and stood. It took every ounce of strength he had left to stumble over to her and wrap his arms around her cold body. "Sarah," he whispered, "I'm so sorry I couldn't protect you." Her tears coursed down her cheeks and dampened his neck.

"Ah," the Lady of Night sighed, "so you are capable of love. I always did wonder."

Jareth turned to glare at her. "What do you want?"

The Lady of Night smiled. "The same thing I've always wanted." She plopped herself into his golden throne. "You know," she added thoughtfully, "I was thinking of letting you rule beside me, but, now I can see that your heart is clearly spoken for." She frowned and sighed. "Such a pity."

A small gurgle drifted into the room from beyond the doorway. The Lady of Night's expression changed in a snap. Her eyes wide with awe, her neck turned to face the doorway.

"No!" Jareth shouted, not daring to move lest he fall again.

Another little sound and the Lady of Night stood and went into the hall, following the noise until she came to a small, dark room where a goblin woman dozed near a baby crib. Her lips parted in wonder when she looked inside the crib and found the infant.

"Hello, you," she cooed gently, lifting the baby from his bed. "You're so beautiful." She stroked his golden locks of hair and stared into his blue-gray eyes.

***

Jeremy followed Sir Didymus silently in the forest, thinking of Brian and Sarah and of how his meeting with the Goblin King would go. _It's only Jareth_, he told himself. _This is Sarah's fiancé. He's family. He'll have to give Brian back to me. But if family really mattered to him, would he have even taken Brian in the first place?_ Jeremy scowled at that thought and tripped over the suddenly still forms of Sir Didymus and Ambrosius.  
With a whump, he landed face-down in the middle of a small clearing, where a small group of large red creatures with chicken-like legs were sitting in a circle, staring at each other.

"What's that?" One creature asked in a slightly interested tone.

"Looks like a man." Another one answered with a bored yawn.

"Oh, um, sorry about that!" Jeremy picked himself up and brushed himself off. "Didn't mean to interrupt anything. "He smiled awkwardly and stepped out of their circle, toward the opposite end of the clearing.

"No worries." A red creature sighed.

"Yeah," another one added glumly, "no nothing."

"My word!" Sir Didymus exclaimed as he caught up with Jeremy and continued leading the way through the trees. "Something is terribly wrong!"

"What makes you say that?" Jeremy asked, looking around as if something were about to jump out at them.

"Well, look at the trees!" The fox waved his hand over his head. "The leaves are dying and there are no seasons here. The Goblin King's power is significantly weakened."

"How do you know that's what it is?" A paper-dry leaf fell of a branch and drifted past Jeremy's nose.

"His power," Sir Didymus answered with a bark, "gives life and magic to the Labyrinth." He barked again, then growled. "If his power is weakened or destroyed, then the Labyrinth," he growled again, "will revert back to its original," he barked twice, "state." Suddenly, the fox leaped off the dog's back, landing on all fours and growling viciously at Ambrosius.

"Sir Didymus!" Jeremy yelped, "what are you doing?"

Ambrosius barked at the fox and chased it off into the trees.

Jeremy watched them go, not entirely sure they were aware of what they were doing. He looked up through the thinning leaves and saw the castle looming ever closer. _I have to save Brian._ Jeremy thought as he continued his march through the forest.


	12. Chapter 12

**Chapter Twelve: Hopeless**

"What is this angel's name?" The Lady of Night whispered as she re-entered the throne room.

Jareth glared at her from his place at Sarah's side, arms still wrapped around her.

The Lady of Night didn't look up as she retook her seat in Jareth's throne. "Does he have a relative coming for him?" She paused for Jareth to answer, but went on even though he didn't, "How much time does the relative have left?"

"I won't tell you anything," the Goblin King announced.

The Lady of Night laughed and finally graced Jareth with her full attention. "You think I need you to tell me anything?" She laughed again. "I know more than you could ever have found out on your own. For example, did you know there was a second verse to that curse about the Labyrinth? You know, the one that starts:

The Goblin King shall rule his maze

Until a girl does seize his gaze.

Then the walls will crumble and fall,

Goblin King be kind to all.

"The rest of it goes like this:

But should the girl choose to stay

And with great power does she play

Dark and shadow will return

Love to break and light to burn.

"So you see," the Lady of Night stood, clutching the baby to her chest, "I have returned from the prison you threw me in, to break your love and burn your light." She walked up to Jareth and Sarah, cuddling the child in her arms. "Incidentally, I really have Sarah to thank. If she hadn't broken your little rule, I would never have found the weak spot in the bonds you tied me to. Of course, even then, I would never have gotten here if Sarah hadn't brought me here herself."

Sarah's gray eyes leaked rivers as they stared apologetically at Jareth's mismatched eyes.

The Goblin King shook his head. "I love her." He told the Lady of Night, still watching Sarah's eyes. "No one can change that." He cupped the side of Sarah's face in his hand.

The Lady of Night laughed. "I never said anything about changing it." She leaned forward and whispered in Jareth's ear. "I said I was here to break it." She waved a hand over Sarah's head and the shadows covered her completely.

"No!" Jareth squeezed Sarah tighter. "What have you done?" He demanded of the woman as Sarah's body went limp in his arms and the shadows suddenly scattered to the corners of the room.

"I've given her a little gift," the Lady of Night answered, sauntering back to the golden throne. "To thank her for all her help." She plunked down and stroked the baby's hair.

"What have you done to her?" The Goblin King demanded again, sitting heavily down on the floor, holding Sarah so that her head rested against his chest.

"It's called the Nightmare Curse," the Lady of Night explained leisurely, "no one can wake her, not even me, and all while she sleeps, her dreams will be filled with all her worst fears."

***

Jeremy finally found his way out of the trees and stood a the top of a hill overlooking a giant landfill. The castle and the walls of the city were both clearly visible just past the mountains of trash. He went on, ignoring the odd little people who milled about among the garbage. When he arrived at the wall, he found the gate slightly ajar with no one around to guard it. The streets beyond were also completely empty. All the windows and doors were shut and locked, though it was getting to be well into morning.

He looked cautiously around him every time he turned a corner, but nothing jumped out at him, nothing fell on his head, and he didn't fall into any random holes. All was quiet. Jeremy approached the castle.

***

Sarah found herself standing in a long corridor with nothing but doors on either side of her. She went to the nearest door and twisted the handle. It came open easily, without so much as a squeak, and Sarah poked her head inside.

Beyond the door, standing only a few feet away in the center of one of the tunnels under the Labyrinth, was the Goblin King, smiling at her. "I love you, Sarah." He held out his hand, palm up.

Sarah started to reach out to him, but stopped when she saw the shadow lizards thundering toward him from behind. "Jareth!" She shouted and tried to grab him, but her feet refused to move. "Jareth!" She shouted again, "the monsters!" Her arm was too short and her fingertips only raked the air in front of him. "JARETH!"

"I love you, Sarah." He said quietly, still smiling as dark creatures crawled up his legs, leaping onto his arms, climbing over his face, latching onto every inch of him with their long, sharp teeth.

Sarah screamed.


	13. Chapter 13

**Chapter Thirteen: Love**

The Lady sat in the throne, cooing at Brian and make faces at him. When his little laugh bubbled out of him, she giggled right along with him.

"You sweet little thing," she sang. "I'll teach you everything you need to know. Most importantly, I'll teach you to love me more than anyone or anything. Then you will rule beside me over the Labyrinth."

Across the room, the Goblin King sat on the floor, clutching the Goblin Queen to his chest.

"Jareth," she muttered in her sleep, "Jareth...Jareth..." Her face contorted with the terrors of her dreams.

"Oh, my Sarah," Jareth mumbled into her ear, rocking her gently in his arms, "I love you, Sarah." He kissed her lips softly. "I love you."

***

Sarah ran down the endless corridor of doors. As she passed them, each door flew open, revealing a new variation of Jareth's death. Always, he reached out to her. Always, he told her he loved her. Always, he died by some manner or other, whether by falling rocks or monsters out of the Labyrinth. He never screamed. He never pleaded with her to save his life. He never called out to her. It might have been easier for Sarah if he had. Instead, he only ever told her he loved her, and she understood that he knew it was her fault he was about to die and he wanted her to know that he forgave her and still loved her anyway.

_But I'll never forgive myself_, Sarah thought as she ran, _this whole thing is my fault, and I'll never forgive myself. The Labyrinth will be destroyed and the Lady of Night will come to power, and Jareth will...Jareth will...Jareth..._ She couldn't bring herself to think it. She only cried as she ran, feet pounding the hard ground, the corridor going on forever ahead of her. _There has to be an end to this eventually. There has to be. I have to get out. Maybe there's something I can do to save him and the Labyrinth or at least one of them._

Suddenly she realized there was a figure in the distance, standing in the middle of the corridor. The doors ahead of her all opened and shadows crept across the floor toward her, wrapping around her ankles, weighing down her feet. The figure was getting closer, and she could tell that it had crazy blond hair that stood in tufts at the top of its head and hung long around his shoulders.

"Jareth!" She shouted as she forced her legs to move forward, the shadows continuing to climb higher up her body, clinging to her waist, reaching up and over her shoulders. "Jareth!" Her voice cracked under the weight of her desperation, the tears flowing down her cheeks.

She flung her arms out in front of her, hoping that if she could just reach him, then maybe she would be freed. The shadows covered her entire body except her face, and they filled her ears with mocking laughter.

"You'll never reach him!" The shadows hissed, "You'll die before you reach him, and he'll die because of you. You don't love him. You never really loved him. He tricked you. He trapped you. He forced you to love him. You did this on purpose, to get revenge. You hate him." Then the shadows laughed at her again.

"No!" Sarah yelled as her muscles finally gave way and she collapsed on the floor just a few miserable feet away from him. "You're wrong!" She choked out, half-sobbing. "I love him!" Her fists clenched and her elbows bent. "I was mad at him at first," she admitted, remembering their early fights as she forced her knees to bend and her legs to move. "but then I got to know him." The image of Jareth's face streaked with vibrant blue blood flashed behind her eyes. "He saved my life!" She felt as though she was pushing against the weight of the entire world, but she knew that she was getting closer, inch by excruciating inch. "He learned how to take care of the Goblins." Slowly, she crawled closer to the familiar black boots. "He's changed so much in the last few years! He's so different now." Finally her fingertips grazed the back of his shining boot.

The man before her turned and knelt to bring his face closer to hers. Sarah looked up and saw not the mismatched eyes of the Goblin King, but the black and deadly eyes of the Lady of Night.

"Don't be so foolish, Sarah." The Lady of Night smiled. "He doesn't love you." She placed her hand on Sarah's forehead. "Jareth, the Goblin King, isn't capable of love."

Then the shadows crawled over Sarah's face and she was surrounded in darkness. Her eyes wouldn't open, her limbs wouldn't move, her thoughts seemed muffled and she felt as though her body was a long way away.

_He does love me, _Sarah protested within her own head, remembering how he'd first tried to please her by giving her a room that was identical to her old bedroom. She'd told him she wanted a castle bedroom, and when he'd given that to her, she still hadn't been happy. Then he'd given her a blended version of both rooms and it had made her laugh. It was the first time she'd laughed in front of him. Her mind scrambled for more memories, more proof that he loved her, and it dragged out an old conversation when she'd spend her first year in the Labyrinth and Jareth had been obligated to allow her a visit hom:

_When can I leave?_ She'd asked him eagerly

_As soon as you want. _ His voice had come in a husky, low tone.

_How long can I stay? _ She'd barely been able to catch her breath.

Jareth had hesitated, and then said something that had sent her heart soaring. _As long as you want._

_What about the wish? I thought it was binding._

_It was._

_What do you mean 'was'?_

_Love changes things, Sarah. You may go and stay with your family as long as you like._

_Love changes things, Sarah. _The memory echoed in her mind. _ Love changes things._

_Love changes people, too._ Sarah added to herself, _you were a very different person when we first met, Jareth. And so was I. The Labyrinth changed me, too, but mostly it was love. Love...wasn't there something else you told me about love once?_ Her mind reached more deeply into her memory, searching for the relevant conversation.

Then it came to her. They'd been talking about a boy named David who was trying to solve the Labyrinth to save his baby sister. _By beating the labyrinth, _Jareth had patiently explained, _he's proved that his love for the child is stronger than his desire to wish her away. He's too weak to beat the city or the castle, but if he faces me and is able to recognize that his love for his sister is stronger than my power over her, then he can have her back._ And David's love had been stronger than Jareth's power, just as Sarah's love for Toby had.

The only thing that had ever been stronger than Jareth's power was love. Until Sarah broke the rules and the Lady of Night was able to free herself. _Sometimes,_ the Wiseman's voice whispered from the back of Sarah's mind, _to love is to be cruel._

Sarah remembered disciplining Toby when she'd been watching over him. It had been cruel, from Toby's point of view, but there was a lesson she'd been trying to teach him at the time. _That's why the rules are so important._ Sarah realized, _wishes have power because they're wishes, and the Labyrinth has power because it's the Labyrinth. Jareth calls on the power of the Labyrinth, but he has to follow the Labyrinth's rules, because the Labyrinth is always fair._

_And the Labyrinth knows that love is always stronger._

Suddenly, as if she were looking far into the distance, Sarah saw a pinprick of light. She focused on it and pulled her consciousness toward it.


	14. Chapter 14

**Chapter Fourteen: The Deal**

Jeremy topped the last of the stairs and entered the throne room. It took half a second for him to see Jareth sitting across the room with Sarah in his lap, and half a second more to find Brian in the arms of a dark-haired woman sitting on a golden throne. He forgot all about the Goblin King and walked up to her.

"Give me the child." Jeremy held out his arms.

***

The pinprick of light in Sarah's dream grew into a large circle and then into a sphere that surrounded her.

_Where am I?_ She wondered, feeling her consciousness floating amidst this strange golden light.

_You are within yourself, _a voice answered inside her own mind.

_Who is that? _Sarah mentally jumped.

_I am light. I am love. I am that part of the Labyrinth that lives within you._

_What do you mean? _Sarah asked as she swirled her field of vision around 180 degrees.

_When you came here, when you began to use the power of the Labyrinth, the Labyrinth began to become a part of who you are. I am that part of the Labyrinth that now lives within you, Sarah Williams._

_You're the Labyrinth? _Somehow she trembled, though she knew she had no body in that place.

_Do not fear me, Sarah._

A wave of warmth and comfort flooded her. _But I broke your rules._

_And then you apologized. I forgave you, but I was too late. The Lady of Night had already risen. She found you easily because it was you who freed her._

_What can I do?_ Sarah demanded wretchedly. _How can I fix this?_

_I can give you more power, Sarah._ The Labyrinth promised grimly, _but it will not come freely._

_Of course,_ the Goblin Queen reasoned, _everything has to be fair._

_I need a voice, Sarah._ The Labyrinth explained with a depth of urgency Sarah would never have guessed possible. _I need someone who will hear me even when I am silent and make my will known to those who must know it._

_But what about Jareth? Doesn't he know you well?_

_He does, but his priority is the goblins. I need someone whose priority will be me._

_What about me, then? _Sarah offered openly, _I could be your voice._

_No, sweet Sarah. Jareth needs you to be always at his side. I would not take you from him._

_Then there is nothing else I can offer you._

_No, there is nothing you have in this moment that you can give me._

_What do you mean? _Sarah felt a sick knowledge rising.

_You will have a son, _the Labyrinth explained what it already knew, _and he will grow to be great and powerful. Let him be my voice._

_What does that mean?_ Fear tied knots around her heart. _Will you take our son from us?_

_No. He will live with you in the Goblin City, but he must not inherit the throne. He may leave this realm from time to time, but he must never be gone long. And if ever I need a voice or a body to do my will, he will be my voice and body. He will be constantly protected. All who are of the Labyrinth will know him._

Sarah considered what the Labyrinth was asking of her. At length, she finally gave in, _what other choice do I have?_

_You could reject my offer and leave things as they are._

Sarah's mental fists clenched. _I can't allow that to happen._

_Then it would seem that you have made your choice._

_Yes,_ Sarah sighed, _I promise you my son._

_Very well, Sarah Williams. Wake._

***

"Ah," the Lady of Night looked Jeremy up and down, "you must be the relative. Tell me," she smiled, cuddling the baby a little closer to her, "what is his name?"

"Give him to me," Jeremy demanded, taking a step closer. "It doesn't matter to you what his name is. He's coming home with me."

The Lady of Night chuckled and lifted a hand to the air. "You bore me." She waved it at him and the shadows in the room launched themselves at him, covering him from head to do.

At about the same time, Sarah's eyes blinked open. "Jareth!" She threw her arms around him and kissed him immodestly.

"Sarah," The Goblin King found it hard to smile and he glanced at the throne behind her. "Jeremy's arrived."

The Goblin Queen turned and saw her step-father struggling against the shadows. "No!" She hauled herself to her feet. "Jeremy!"

"Sarah!" Jareth stood and put a hand on her shoulder. "Please..."

She turned and looked into his sad, heavy eyes. "I'm sorry, Jareth." Sarah wrapped her arms around him, partly to keep herself from running to Jeremy's aid. "I didn't understand before, and now I've caused all this trouble. It nearly got you -" she stopped and swallowed, remembering the horrid images of her nightmares, "I nearly lost you because of it."

"Hush," he whispered near her ear, "you haven't lost anything, or anyone." He squeezed her gently. "I'm still here."

Just then, Jeremy let out a shout and burst through the shadows that the Lady of Night had thrown at him. He leaped forward and threw himself at her, grabbing the child right out of her arms.

"He's done it!" Jareth announced.

Sarah snapped her fingers and Jeremy and Brian were gone.

"No!" The Lady of Night screamed as she regained her footing. "You!" Her finger jabbed out at Sarah. "You shouldn't even be awake!"


	15. Chapter 15

**Chapter Fifteen: Light**

"Jeremy?" Linda's voice called from the front door.

Jeremy blinked at his dark bedroom. Brian squirmed in his arms. Jeremy looked down at the sleeping baby.

"Oh, my Brian!" Tiffany swooped into the room and collected her little boy from his uncle's arms. "He's so sound asleep! Oh I hope he wasn't too much trouble!"

"No," Jeremy answered a little breathlessly, "no trouble at all."

"Thank you so much for watching him," Linda wrapped her arms around his waist and pecked him on the lips. "We had a really fantastic time today."

"Yeah, thank you so much, Jeremy!" Tiffany kissed him on the cheek and then grabbed her still-packed-up baby bag.

"Uh, do you want help with that?" Jeremy removed himself from his wife and took the bag from his sister. "Lemme get the doors for you." He smiled and walked her out of the apartment and down to her car.

When he got back, Linda was sitting on the bed in her nightgown, waiting for him.

***

Sarah marched across the throne room and met the Lady of Night in the middle. "You got the prophecy wrong."

"Sarah," Jareth stood uncertainly behind her, "what are you doing?"

"She's getting herself killed is what she's doing." The Lady of Night raised her arms and the room was filled with shadows, darting back and forth, trembling, swaying, crawling.

The Goblin Queen raised her own arms and closed her eyes. _Okay, Labyrinth. A whole lot of light would be really good right about now._

"Sarah!"

"Stay back!" Sarah commanded her fiance as light began to fill the spaces between the shadows. "I realized something in that dream I had just now. The line in the prophecy that goes 'love to break and light to burn'." A golden glow surrounded everything the room, forcing the shadows to shrink and fall apart. "It means that love will break the darkness and light will burn the shadows. Jeremy broke your power with his love for his nephew, and I'm burning your shadows with the light of the Labyrinth."

"Don't fool yourself!" The Lady of Night growled. "I am the most powerful thing in this Labyrinth!" She screeched and forced the shadows forward one more time.

Sarah closed her eyes and relaxed, allowing the light and warmth of the Labyrinth to fill her. "No," she replied calmly, "you're not." The Goblin Queen opened her eyes then and watched as the Lady of Night was surrounded by nothing but gold light.

"No!" The Lady of Night was swallowed up by the light, which wrapped itself around her and shrank slowly down into a sphere that gradually became a point and then vanished entirely.

Sarah swayed on her feet before Jareth put his arms around her. "Sarah," he said quietly but firmly, "where did that come from?"

"Where did what come from?" She touched a hand to her pounding temple.

"That power." He led her over to the silver throne and helped her sit down. "The Labyrinth would never give anything like that away for free."

Sarah smiled. "I told it you knew it well."

Jareth's eyebrows drew together. "You spoke to the Labyrinth."

Sarah nodded, the smile fading quickly.

"What did you promise it?" He tried to keep his voice calm, but didn't quite manage it.

She studied his face for a moment, the blue smudges, the healing cuts and gashes, his disheveled yellow hair, his pleading eyes, his thin, pressed lips. Sarah took a deep breath. "It said it needs a voice, and a body, someone who can do its will and make its will known to others."

"And you promised it you would do this?" He took her hands in his and held them over his heart.

"No." Sarah shook her head and squeezed his hands. "I promised it that our future son would."

Jareth's eyes widened and he dropped her hands. He stood and turned away from her. Sarah leaned back in the throne, noticing the afternoon light that drifted through the window. How long had she been without sleep? _Besides the nightmares,_ she thought to herself. _Those were just as exhausting as being awake._

"You promised it," Jareth whispered, "our son." He whirled on her then. "But you're not...we're not going to have..."

"No." Sarah shook her head again. "You've been very understanding about respecting the boundaries I asked you to. But once we've gotten married, there won't be any boundaries." She watched him stare at her. "What else could I do, Jareth?" She asked wearily. "Let her take the Labyrinth?"

He shook his head and went back to pacing. "You never should have broken the rule in the first place," he muttered. "If you had just listened to me."

"I know." Sarah murmured. "I'm so sorry, Jareth."

The Goblin King stopped pacing again and looked at his wife, at the dark rings above her cheeks, at the ghosts of the horrifying nightmares in her expression, at her wrinkled dress, her tangled hair, her pain-filled gray eyes. The anger that was trying to fester drained out of him. He went and knelt before her, "what will we do?" He whispered.

Sarah shrugged and leaned toward him, taking his face in her hands. "Love our son, and love each other. The Labyrinth said he would never come to harm, and that he could leave this world for short periods of time, but he would never be able to stay away very long. It said he could live with us here in the castle. I don't know how the power of the Labyrinth will show itself in him, but the Labyrinth told me that everyone who is of the Labyrinth will know him."

"But what does that mean?"

"I don't know." Sarah whispered back, rubbing her thumb across his cheek. "But I do know that both of us need a good bath and a long sleep."

Jareth nodded, covering her hands with his. "The Labyrinth knows what it's doing. We'll just have to trust it."

_**********************************************************************************************_

_Author's Note: So what do you guys think so far? Just to let you know, I'm only about halfway to two-thirds done with the plotline of this story, and there really IS going to be a wedding in the Labyrinth. I just wondered what you think about the Lady of Night and how I've developed the different characters. Is there anyone you haven't seen that you would like to see more of? I've got the major plot sorted out, but the details can still change. From here on out, I'll be really getting away from the original Labyrinth characters and doing more with things that are more just from my own head.  
_


	16. Chapter 16

**Chapter Sixteen: A Sudden Visit**

"Linda," Jeremy asked suddenly over a quiet breakfast of cold cereal.

"Yes, dear?" She looked up from the script she was reading.

"What's Sarah's phone number?"

Linda's eyebrows scrunched together. "Um...I don't think I have it, actually. She's usually very good about calling us anyway. Why do you want it?"

Jeremy shrugged. "I was just thinking about her lately. Don't you think it's weird we didn't meet Jareth before they got engaged?"

"Oh, Jeremy," Linda waved a hand at him, "don't act so behind the times. I'm just glad she brought him out here before they were married with three kids."

Jeremy frowned at what was left of his breakfast.

"Well, I'm off or I'll be late." Linda deposited her bowl in the sink, pecked her husband on the lips, and danced out the door.

***

Sarah frowned into the crystal.

A familiar triple-pound knock rang against her door.

"It's open," she absently announced.

"Sarah?" Jareth stepped into the room. "Are you well?"

"I'm not sick, if that's what you're asking." she sighed and dismissed the image of her step-father from the crystal.

"Then why aren't you up?" He asked as he crossed the room. "May I?" He motioned at the bed.

"Of course." Sarah smiled and held out her hands.

Jareth took them in his and returned her smile warmly as he sat down on the edge of her bed. "What's troubling you, my love?"

Sarah closed her eyes as the familiar shudder tingled pleasantly up her spine. "Should I tell Jeremy?"

"Tell him what?" Jareth's pointed eyebrows drew together.

Sarah took a deep breath. "That the Labyrinth is real and it wasn't just a dream. He's been asking my mom about me all week."

Jareth studied his fiancé's gray eyes. "Do you trust him?"

Sarah's initial impulse was to respond with an abrupt, 'yes, of course I do – He's family,' but the look on Jareth's face stopped her. _He's not trying to be offensive, _she told herself, _he just wants to be sure our world will be safe. He's trying to protect the Labyrinth, which is probably why he hasn't gone parading around on Earth as the Goblin King before. Can I trust Jeremy to keep our secret?_

"Yes," the Goblin Queen answered quietly, solemnly, "I trust him."

Jareth nodded. "Then do as you see fit. In the meantime," he released her hands and stood, "I should like to eat before the council convenes."

"Okay." Sarah stretched and climbed out of bed in her dark blue nightgown. "I'll be down in a minute."

"I'll be waiting." He took her chin in one hand and delicately touched his lips to hers before vanishing.

***

A short hour later, while the Goblin King convened with the goblin council, the Goblin Queen retreated to her bedroom to take care of some family business. As soon as she touched the crystal, the image bloomed within and she could hear the phone ringing.

"Hello?" Jeremy picked up the apartment phone.

"Hey, Jeremy!" Sarah answered brightly.

"Sarah!" Jeremy took a step back and looked all around the room suspiciously. "I was just thinking of calling you, but it turns out we don't have your number."

"Well," Sarah responded smoothly, "now I've called you. So what's up?"

"Well," Jeremy began checking behind and underneath every piece of furniture in the apartment. "I had this really crazy dream a few nights ago, and you were in it."

"Really?" Sarah tried to sound interested, but thought she probably just sounded like she was dreading the upcoming conversation. "What happened?"

Jeremy summed up his adventure in the Labyrinth as best he could without taking forever. "Pretty crazy, huh?" He asked, finally satisfied with the state of his apartment and flopping onto the couch.

"Yeah," the Goblin Queen agreed, "that was pretty crazy. Do you want to know what happened after you left?"

Her step-father stared at the air in front of his face for a moment while Sarah bit her lip. "It really happened?"

"Yes," Sarah confirmed quietly, "it did."

Jeremy nodded. "And you're really the Goblin Queen?"

Sarah smirked. "Make a wish of the Goblin Queen and see what happens – but just be careful how you word it."

"Okay," Jeremy rubbed his chin, "I wish that the Goblin Queen would bring me to visit her in the goblin castle."

"Done." Smiling, Sarah snapped her fingers and vanished.

She appeared near the edge of the enormous and colorfully overpopulated flowerbed of the courtyard next to her stunned step-father. "Hey!"

"Sarah!" He looked her up and down, taking in her dark yellow dress, then turned around in a circle. "Where are we?"

The Goblin Queen's smile took on a crafty edge, "the courtyard. Jareth's with the goblin council right now, which is where I usually am in the morning as well." she wandered over to a stone bench and sat on one side, leaving room for Jeremy. "But I had some family business to take care of today instead."

"I see." Jeremy sat down warily. "Nothing's going to jump out at me is it?"

Sarah laughed. "No, not here. The Labyrinth likes to play tricks, and there are so many strange creatures living in it, but this is where Jareth and I live. Everything's perfectly safe."

"Even the goblins?" Jeremy glanced over his shoulder.

"Especially the goblins."

"What about the Goblin King?" Jeremy asked while staring behind him.

"Of course Jareth is safe." Sarah turned to see what her step-father was looking at. "Oh."

"Are you sure?" Jeremy's voice cracked at the end of his question.

"Stay here." The Goblin Queen jumped up and went to meet her fiancé before he arrived at the bench. "What happened to the council?" She inquired brightly.

"I adjourned it," Jareth explained with a scowl, "when the goblins stopped arguing and sat very still like someone was wishing away a baby, and after a second they all looked at each other like they didn't know what to do."

"Oh."

The Goblin King took a very deep breath and questioned here in a low, even tone, "what is he doing here, Sarah?"

Sarah answered him confidently, "he wished that the Goblin Queen would bring him to visit with her in the castle."

"Does he know he only has one wish left?"

Sarah frowned. "I thought he'd get three from each of us."

Jareth shook his head and sighed. _Three years,_ he thought to himself, _and she's still taking __things for granted._ "We both draw our power from the Labyrinth," he explained patiently, "and the Labyrinth only grants three wishes."

"Oh." Sarah glanced over her shoulder at where her step-father was sitting, watching them like a mouse might watch a pair of hungry cats. "Would you like to explain that to him?"


	17. Chapter 17

**Chapter Seventeen: Change of Plan**

"So why aren't you guys going to have the wedding here?" Jeremy asked after a lengthy Q & A session with Jareth and Sarah.

"Because it wouldn't be practical," the Goblin Queen answered.

"The Labyrinth isn't an inn," the Goblin King added. "You can't just whisk people in and out according to what you feel like."

"But you have to bring people here if they wish for it, right?" Jeremy inquired thoughtfully.

"Depending on how the wish is worded, yes," Jareth replied just as thoughtfully, "but you can't just go around wishing for things without thinking about it first."

Sarah glanced sidelong at Jareth, but decided to let the comment go.

"Well, I've thought about it," Jeremy went on, "and I think I know what I want my third wish to be."

Sarah sucked in her breath.

"Alright," Jareth drew himself up, "let's hear it then."

"I wish," Jeremy began slowly, "that the Goblin King and the Goblin Queen would get married in their castle and bring the guests here instead of sending the goblins to earth."

Sarah's jaw hung open. Jareth stared at Jeremy, searching for his voice.

Sarah glanced from one man to the other, waiting for someone else to say something.

"I should chastise you for that," Jareth finally spoke quietly, "or at least send you into the Labyrinth for a spell, but neither of those would do anything to change the wish. If you were Sarah's biological father, then I would say that I now know exactly where her thick-headedness comes from. As it is, I'll just have to assume you learned it from her mother."

"Jareth!" Sarah admonished, stepping into the conversation, "I don't think it's a very good idea, either, but that's no reason to be insulting."

"I apologize." The Goblin King bowed and turned to walk a few steps away.

"What did I do?" Jeremy whispered urgently to Sarah.

She sighed. "Well, you've made a wish of us that we have to grant and neither of us like it. Do you have any idea how my father and Irene will react to this place?"

"Tell them it's a suped up hotel."

Sarah gave him the look she reserved for exceptionally stupid goblins. "And what do I tell them when they want to go outside and see the city?"

"Don't let them stay long enough for that." Jeremy suggested immediately. "Just bring them here for the ceremony and then send them back to earth."

"Do you even know how much magic that would take?" Sarah glanced at her fiancé. "We're still recovering from dealing with a situation that came up while you were here before."

"Wait, was it something I did?" Jeremy took a step back.

"No, no." Sarah rubbed her face in her hands. "It was all my fault, really." She took a deep breath. "Anyway, we had to fight this really powerful sorceress and we barely won by the skin of our teeth. Our magic is limited. The magic of the Labyrinth is limited. We can't just snap our fingers and change the shape of the world."

"But I'm not asking you to change the shape of the world," Jeremy protested. "I'm asking you to have the wedding here."

"You haven't asked us anything. You've made a wish. It will happen." The Goblin Queen pressed the fingers of one hand to her temple. "I just don't understand why you'd wish for something like this."

"Because this place is amazing!" Jeremy waved his hands at the courtyard, "you could have it out here, over by those trees." He pointed to the peach trees.

_And there could be a ball in the evening,_ Sarah thought to herself, _after we send everyone else home, and Jareth and I could dance ourselves dizzy_. "And what am I going to tell everyone? They haven't had your experience, and even if they had, Dad and Irene's brains would probably melt rather than cope with something like this."

Jeremy shrugged. "Tell them you got a job offer managing a hotel and they let you have your wedding in the courtyard for free."

Sarah stared at him. "This is going to require so much energy."

"Hey, you were planning on brining all your goblin friends to the real world." Jeremy protested. "What makes this so much harder?"

"Goblins believe in earth," Sarah explained, "they know the earth is real. People don't know this place is real and have a hard enough time even trying to believe in it. It's easier to send goblins to earth because they know it's real and they're willing and ready to go. Bringing a person to a place they don't know about and can't believe in is ten times harder. Trust me, I've already asked Jareth about all the possibilities. We debated about it for a long time, and the plan we came up with seemed to be the easiest and simplest."

"But your wish will be granted," the Goblin King announced, returning to the conversation with all his cool confidence. "If Sarah will agree to restrict her guest list to immediate family, I think it is very possible we will have enough energy to do it between the two of us. Besides that we will have the Labyrinth's help." He came to stand beside her and wrapped his fingers around hers, smiling down at her. "It will be done."

"That's great!" Jeremy clapped his hands together. "Alright, I think my work here is done. If you don't mind, I really need to be getting back. Linda will be home from rehearsal soon."

The Goblin King nodded and Sarah's step-father vanished before their eyes.

"Are you really okay with this?" She looked up into his blue and brown eyes, searching them carefully for any clues to what was going on inside his head.

"Yes, my love." He traced her chin with his finger. "It's not my first choice, but it will work, and it's only for a few hours, right? We'll have as much time as we want to recover and move forward in our relationship and go on ruling the goblins and sending relatives after their babies."

Sarah grinned up at him. "Thank you, Jareth." She wrapped her arms around him.

"For what?" He wrapped his arms around her.

"For being wonderful."


	18. Chapter 18

**Chapter Eighteen: Perfectly Prepared**

So the months passed, Sarah sent her invitations to her immediate family members and announcements to everyone else on her list. There weren't many besides a few friends from high school she was still vaguely in touch with, but even those few would be too many for her and Jareth to bring to the Labyrinth. Meanwhile, there was the goblin council, the goblin petty court, and occaisonal babies to look after. Since her encounter with the Lady of Night, Sarah had gained a new respect for the way Jareth did things, working within the binding wish to somehow help these people prove themselves to the Labyrinth. She also noticed that he stopped working quite as hard to get in their way, and was almost willing to be helpful. As a consequence, nearly half the people who wished away their infants were able to retrieve them, and Sarah felt confident about the statistics improving in the future.

Finally, the day of the wedding arrived, and Sarah felt as though she were constantly standing in a cloud. Middleweed helped her with her make up and hair and dress after lunch. They were standing together in her bedroom, putting together the finishing touches, relaxed in the knowledge that everything was going according to plan, anxious that the momentous occasion was about to begin.

"There!" Middleweed stepped back to admire the bride, her purple horns glowing. "I don't think we could make you any more beautiful than you are right now."

Sarah smiled and turned to examine herself in the mirror of her vanity table. "You think Jareth will like it? The dress was my design this time." Her fiancé had a habit of magically depositing beautiful dresses into her closet on almost a daily basis so that her closet had adopted extra rows of hanging bars and an impossible depth.

"Oh, I think-" the goblin was interrupted by a knock at the door. "Isn't it traditional that the groom not see the bride until the ceremony?"

"This is a special situation," the Goblin Queen informed Middleweed. "It's open," she said louder so that the person on the other side of the door would hear her clearly.

"Sarah," Jareth's melodic voice filled the room, "it's time."

Middleweed slipped past the Goblin King out to the hallway.

"Alright." The Goblin Queen took a deep breath and turned around to face her fiancé.

The first thing Jareth noticed was her hair, moussed and fluffed to perfection with curling white ribbons clipped in behind her ears. Then he saw the subtle color on her gray eyelids, rosy cheeks, and pink lips, emphasizing the paleness of her skin. The dress was ivory with a low V-neck and long sleeves that were parted to reveal her slender arms and had holes at the top that exposed her white shoulders. Directly under Sarah's bust was a layer of ivory lace that hugged close to her frame until just below her hips, where the lace opened and parted to let three layers of skirts to explode around her legs, the final length of ivory silk trailing out around her feet. Her two-inch heeled, peep-toe shoes looked as though they were made purely of diamonds and refused not to sparkle. The last thing he noticed was that her fingernails and toenails had been covered in a sparkling silver polish.

Sarah watched him cross the room in three enormous steps, wearing a slim black tuxedo with a ruffled white shirt underneath. Jareth took his fiancé's chin between his finger and thumb, stared deeply into her gray eyes, and gently wrapped his lips around hers. Sarah responded in kind and tried not to pout when he pulled away.

"You look beautiful," he whispered, running the fingers of his other hand from her temple to her jawbone.

Sarah's back shivered pleasantly. "Thank you." Her faced burned. "But we should probably get my family here. They're all waiting at Jeremy's apartment."

Jareth cleared his throat and took a step back. "Yes, of course." He pulled a crystal into existence, looking in at Jeremy's apartment, where Sarah's family had filled the couches and chairs, all dressed in their best attire. He and Sarah listened as the apartment phone rang.

"Hello?" Jeremy snatched the phone before Linda could reach it, grinning at her with a wink.

"It's Jareth. If you get everyone into the cars now and just start driving, I believe we can handle it from there."

"Okay! That's great! We'll see you soon!" Jeremy hung up the phone and announced to everyone that it was time to go. With a certain amount of grumbling about 'odd ways of doing things', the family followed him out to the two SUVs that would carry them to the wedding.

Jareth and Sarah closed their eyes, linking their hands, both concentrating all their energy on bringing two enormous vehicles filled with people who didn't know anything about the Labyrinth into their castle courtyard. There, the goblins, enchanted to look like humans, would help them find their seats under the large white tent that had been erected for the ceremony. The Wiseman was already there as well, standing at a small podium under the peach trees, his hat gagged and carefully decorated to look like an extremely tall black top-hat.

The cars barely reached the end of the apartment complex parking lot before the scenery around them morphed into the gardens of the castle courtyard.

Jareth staggered back a step and Sarah touched the back of her hand to her forehead, huffing as though she'd just run a mile. "Will it be that hard to send them home?" She asked, looking up at the groom.

The Goblin King shook his head. "They believe in home. It won't be quite as hard."

"Good." Sarah sat down at her vanity table. "I don't think I could do that again today."

Jareth nodded and smoothed down the front of his tux. "I'll just go down and get everyone settled."

"Yeah," Sarah smiled up at him, "I'll be down in a minute. Just start the music when you're ready for me."


	19. Chapter 19

**Chapter Nineteen: A Goblin Wedding**

Soft notes fluttered on the breeze, announcing the arrival of the bride. All heads turned as Sarah marched slowly, gracefully down the aisle of white garden chairs toward the podium underneath the peach trees. The goblins watched her pass through human eyes, tilted their heads with human necks, and perked up their very human ears. Sarah couldn't help noticing from the corner of her eye how their smiles faded into blank looks, staring into the distance as if listening to some sound far off in the distance.

The Goblin Queen's panic nearly flooded into smile as she met Jareth at the podium.

"Please be seated," the Wiseman began. The front row, which consisted entirely of Sarah's family, sat. "We are gathered here today..."

"Did you see that?" Sarah whispered from the corner of her mouth.

"Yes, I saw." Jareth whispered back sharply. "What do you want me to do?"

"...in holy matrimony..." the Wiseman droned on before them, the hat watching the bride and groom intently.

"I don't know," Sarah hissed, "just don't let my family see anything!"

Jareth glared down at her without turning his head toward her. "You know we can't spare the energy."

"...marriage is an important step in life..."

Sarah's sparkling peep-toed shoe lashed out at the Wiseman's ankle. "Skip to the end," she mouthed.

"...er?" The Wiseman leaned closer. "What's that?"

"Skip to the end!" Sarah whispered with more volume.

"Oh, uh, er, well, it's not traditional – ouch! – but I suppose I can make an exception." The Wiseman cleared his throat. "Do you, Jareth, take Sarah Williams to be your lawfully wedded wife?"

The Goblin King took a deep breath and straightened. "I do." His voice rang out clearly over the silent audience.

"And do you, Sarah Williams, take Jareth to be your lawfully wedded husband?"

"I do," she answered immediately, loudly, firmly.

"Then I now pronounce you husband and wife. You may kiss the bride." The hat mumbled something inside its tophat disguise.

Jareth turned to Sarah, took her face in her hands and pressed his mouth against hers. Sarah tossed her bouquet over her should and wrapped her arms around him while the front row cheered. She broke the kiss almost as soon as it had landed and turned immediately to her family, waving at them to follow her.

"Come on! The reception's going to be in the dining hall." She grabbed Toby and carried him all the way down the aisle and into the castle, her relatives following behind.

Jeremy paused, the last in line, and stood next to Jareth for moment. "What are they doing?" He asked, watching the other guests stare oddly at the air in front of their faces.

Jareth took a deep breath. "They're listening to a mortal human wish me to take away a baby."

"What?" Jeremy jumped back, lost his balance, and caught himself on one of the chairs. "Right now? Can't they just ignore it? This is Sarah's wedding, for crying out loud!"

"Yes, right now." Jareth yanked his coat off and laid it over the back of a chair. "No, they can't ignore it." Before his eyes, the humans melted into their true goblin forms and vanished. "And, in case you had forgotten," he gave Jeremy a cold glare, "this happens to be my wedding too." Then Jareth was gone as well.

"Aye carumba!" The hat crowed, finally having freed itself from its costume prison. "How do you think they will fix it?"

"Hmm?" The Wiseman tried to look up at his hat, crossing his eyes in the process. "Fix what?"

"The wedding!" The hat squawked back.

"The reception!" Jeremy jumped up and ran off through the gardens, into the castle, and through the large oak door, to a large room with a long table where everyone was sitting silently, staring at him expectantly. "Uh," he glanced at Sarah, who nodded at Jareth's empty seat and mouthed 'help'. Jeremy cleared his throat. "Jareth just had to go take care of some urgent, uh, accounting thing. Very important business client. Couldn't wait. He, uh, said we should just start without him." He forced a smile and went to sit down next to his wife.

"Thank you, Jeremy." Sarah stood, distracting everyone's attention away from the empty silver plates in front of them. "I'm sure that Jareth will join us as soon as he can. In the meantime," she glanced at the plates and willed them to fill themselves with garlic chicken breasts, broccoli, and garlic toast, "I wanted to thank you all for coming, and for all that you've done for me," she glanced at the goblets and willed them to fill with wine or sparkling cider, depending on the drinker, "and for welcoming Jareth into the family with wide open arms. Um, his family had to go and, um, take care of another family thing, so they won't be able to join us for the reception, but I promise you the food's good and the company we do have is the best anyway." Everyone made mild approving noises politely. "So, thank you so much again, for all your love and we love you so much." She sat down with a smile and everyone clapped.

Robert Williams cleared his throat and stood. "It's traditional, I believe, for the father of the bride to give a speech at the reception. I won't be long, because I don't like eating cold chicken." This elicited scattered laughter from the other relatives. "Well, Sarah was always a beautiful girl, but now she's grown into a ravishing woman." He raised his cup, "I would like to propose a toast to the most handsome couple I have ever seen in my life." He turned to Sarah as everyone lifted their goblets. "If your children are even half as beautiful as you inside and out, they will be the greatest philanthropist super models this world has ever seen." Grinning, he took a sip of his glass, to the quiet chuckles of a few people and a number of disapproving glares.

The side door opened just as the conversation began to pick up and people had started into their meals. The Goblin King joined his wife at the head of the table with a tired smile and dark lines under his eyes.

"How is everything?" Sarah asked tensely.

"Fine." Jareth squeezed her hand between them. "Middleweed's got it."

"And the other one?" The Goblin Queen inquired with a raised eyebrow.

"Hoggle."

Sarah breathed a sigh of relief and smiled at her family.

A high-pitched gurgling laugh tinkled into the room, and every head turned to stare at the door Jareth had left slightly ajar. A dark-haired baby boy was crawling across the floor, burbling and giggling to himself as if he knew the best secret joke in the world.

"Sam!" Jareth leaped out of his chair and scooped the child up.

Sarah caught Irene's raised eyebrow and felt her face flush scarlet.

"He's just my nephew." Jareth explained to everyone. "Sorry about that. I promised to watch him today and I thought he was asleep just now. I'll just put him to bed." With a brief, stiff bow, Jareth swept through the door, leaving Sarah alone with her slightly suspicious family.


	20. Chapter 20

_Author's Note: Finally! A longer chapter! Sorry for the shortness of the more recent ones. I've been struggling with writer's block lately, but I promised myself to write at least one chapter every day, so I've been trying to force something out. Now I think the plot is finally picking up again and it's really getting good._

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**Chapter Twenty: Explanations**

"Jareth?" An older version of Sarah's voice startled Jareth out of rocking the baby.

"Oh! Mrs. Williams-"

"Linda." She corrected him, crossing the small, dim baby room. "Oh, he's so beautiful. Such curly dark hair. Just like Sarah's."

The Goblin King went to the crib to lay the sleeping child down. "I know how this must look to you, but he's really not ours."

"Oh, please, you don't have to put up an act for me!" Linda protested quietly, standing beside Jareth, looking into the crib. "I don't have any illusions about the kind of relationship engaged couples have these days."

Jareth's face warmed up just a little. "Actually, Sarah has made the boundaries quite clear, and I have respected those boundaries for the last four years. This child is my nephew. I watch him quite frequently. Now, if you don't mind, I do believe everyone will be wondering where we've been." He turned toward the doorway and motioned for Linda to go ahead.

Sarah's mother put her hands on her hips. "Now, listen, Jareth. You are part of the family now, and I do not tolerate lies. I promise I won't judge you and I will still love you and Sarah the same as I always have. I just want you to be honest with me."

Jareth took a deep breath. "I am being honest with you. Why do you have so little faith-"

"SIRE!" A goblin launched into the room in full battle armor, gray beard slightly singed at the end. "The fireys! They've gotten into the city and they're wreaking havoc among the goblins?"

The Goblin King glanced over his shoulder at the curious-filled expression on Linda's face. "Are you sure you want the truth, Linda?"

Mrs. Williams stopped gawking at the short humanoid creature with a long snout and blinked at Jareth. "Yes?"

"Very well." With as little effort as possible, he vanished them both from the castle into the center of the goblin city, where all manner of goblins of all shapes and sizes were yelling, screaming, running, jumping, leaping, diving, rolling, and hiding.

All around them, windows were broken, doors hung open, flower vases and other glass containers had been smashed all over the ground. Vendor carts were turned over, their contents scattered and broken. Linda's mind struggled to comprehend.

"I know Sarah's told you I am an accountant." Jareth explained, taking a few steps into the street. "That was a lie. I am actually the Goblin King, and this is the goblin city. We are surrounded by the Labyrinth, which is a place unto itself. My realm is called the Underground. Sarah met me once when she wished Toby would be taken away by the Goblin King. Does any of this sound familiar to you, Linda?" He smirked at her, while the firey's voices yelped and hooted not too far away.

"I thought..." Mrs. Williams stepped uneasily onto the cobles, staring around her at the leaning buildings. "...but it was just a dream...Sarah was asleep when I got back to her room..."

"Yes, that's usually how you humans write it off." Jareth mumbled. "But it does look familiar?"

Linda nodded. "I remember when they brought me through here. There were goblins everywhere. They were all staring."

"That's because you were the second grown human they'd ever seen in their lives," Jareth explained, meandering down a cluttered lane. "I was the first, and Sarah the third."

"I still don't understand what happened." Linda touched her fingers to her temple as she followed behind the Goblin King. "I was walking circles in the maze, and so hopelessly lost."

"I sent the goblins to find you," Jareth went on, hands clasped behind his back, paces tapping steadily against the cobbles, "so that I could send Sarah home."

"But you had said I couldn't have her back until after I'd beaten the Labyrinth." Linda protested, jogging a few steps to catch up with him and walk beside him. "I think I only wandered around for a few hours before they came to get me."

The Goblin King nodded. "I know. Usually, I can't make exceptions like that." He stopped and turned to her, looking her squarely in the eye, "I would do anything for Sarah. I knew then when I held her in my arms as a babe that she would grow into a lovely woman with a truly beautiful heart. I don't know exactly what happened or how I knew it. It was as if someone had flipped a switch and I realized I'd been crawling around in the dark all my life, and Sarah was my light." He smiled gently then. "I didn't fall in love with her. I was born loving her, and didn't know it until I met her, even though she was so small then. That's why I could send you back to earth without waiting for you figure out the Labyrinth. True Love overrules everything."

Linda watched him turn and walk to the end of the street, realizing that the man her daughter had only just married that afternoon had probably been stalking her since the he'd met her as a baby. _I did this to them._ Linda thought to herself. _I made the wish that brought her to him. He might never have met her if not for me. But then how did she ever get to know him?_ "Jareth," she marched down the street and grabbed his wrist, turning him to face her. "What did you do to Sarah?"

"What are you talking about?" He took a small step back and wrenched his arm away from the woman.

"You bewitched her or put a spell on her or something, didn't you?" Linda demanded. "She's not really in love with you at all, is she? You can't just keep her here like this! You have to let her go!"

"Linda, I promise you, there's no spell. Sarah wished to live her of her own free will. I sent her home and told her she could stay, but she chose to come back!" He held up his hands pleadingly. "Please, believe me, I would never do anything to take Sarah's power of choice from her. If I had wanted to force her into anything, I would have made sure you failed that night and kept her here to raise her myself."

"No." Linda shook her head and started to back away from him. "No, I won't believe it. You've got everyone here under a spell, and you're going to keep us here for ever." Her eyes widened with a new understanding. "I've got to go warn everyone." She turned away from him and ran.

"Linda! Wait!" Jareth shouted and started to follow her, but a goblin ran past with a firey's arms wrapped around his head and the Goblin King paused long enough to wrench the arms off the goblin. When he looked up again, He could see no sign of Linda. With a scowl, he vanished.

"Jareth!" Sarah jumped up out of her chair and glanced around to see if her family had noticed.

"We need to talk." He took her wrist and pulled her to the doorway.

"Sorry, everyone!" Sarah yelped back into the room. "We'll just be a minute. The chairs are still set up outside if you want to get some fresh air!" As soon as the door was shut behind them, Jareth vanished them into the baby room, where he went immediately to check on the child. "Okay, Jareth." Sarah folded her arms over her chest. "What is it?"

"It's your mother." Jareth answered quietly, adjusting the blanket covering the baby. "And the fireys." He briefly explained the situation in the city and the disappearance of Sarah's mother.

"So what are we waiting-"

"Don't!" Jareth grabbed her arm so hard he almost bruised her. "We only have so much magic and we still have to send everyone home later. Remember how difficult it was bringing them here?"

"But you said it would be easy to send them home." Sarah responded quizzically.

"At the time," he released her arm and took a step back, "I had not anticipated having to deal with a baby, the fireys, or a runaway mother."

"How's the baby's relative doing anyway?" The Goblin Queen asked tiredly.

"I don't know." Jareth pulled a crystal into the world and held it between them. "Oh, look! He's found fluffy."

"What's fluffy?" Sarah asked, peering around him and into the crystal.

A large gray-furred, six-legged creature with a black face and a mouth shaped like a plunger was chasing a small, blond girl and a familiar-looking dwarf.


	21. Chapter 21

_Author's Note: Okay, so epic fail with the one chapter a day thing, BUT I did do something involving the Labyrinth when I wasn't writing chapters! I was making a *drumroll* MUSIC VIDEO (called "Just Move On" with "Come Back Down" by Lifehouse as the audio track)!!! You can find it under my youtube screen name: DaphneCaeli. In the meantime, I bring you not just one, but two chapters today! woohoo! and hopefully two chapters tomorrow to make up for the lack of chapters of the last few days...anyhow, enjoy!_

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**Chapter Twenty-One: Exhausted Efforts**

"Jeremy?" Sarah touched her step-father's elbow. "Can I talk to you for a second?"

"Sure," he followed her back to the door that led into the castle while Jareth walked past them, into the garden, to mingle with the family.

"Okay," Sarah took a deep breath, concentrating on the explanation she had worked out with Jareth. "Mom found out, kind of accidentally, about the Labyrinth, and she needs to, um, digest, so we're going to talk to her and show her around and we'll bring her back later today."

"Oh wow," Jeremy looked around, searching the faces of the people in the garden. "I wondered where she'd got off to. Can I help? Where is she?"

"No!" Sarah's arms shot up abruptly and she shook her hands at him. "Uh, if she finds out you knew, it's just going to complicate her reaction – you know how she is." She put her hands on his shoulders and pushed him back toward the rest of the family. "Actually, Jareth and I need you to help everyone get home. It took a lot of energy to get you all here and we don't have much left. Just focus on the driveway into the apartment complex. We'll do the rest."

Then they were surrounded by family and Sarah went immediately to Jareth's side, leave Jeremy to realize she wasn't giving him a different option.

"How'd it go?" He asked in a pleasant tone through a frozen smile.

"Fine." Sarah answered in a similar manner. "Are they ready to go?"

"I've explained we need to get going for the honeymoon and you're mother's staying to help you pack." Jareth explained with a nod at Jeremy's sister who had approached them to bid them farewell.

It was the first of many well-wishing and slightly tearful good-byes, but soon enough they were all loaded in the cards. Jareth and Sarah stood together, holding hands, waving, forcing smiles, concentrating on sending them all back to the apartment complex. Sarah could feel the strain in the marrow of her bones, draining every ounce of strength in her body. Sweat beaded on Jareth's forehead.

The cars drove past them, and vanished back to Earth.

Sarah and Jareth leaned on each other. "Okay," Sarah breathed. "Now I go find my mother and bring her back here."

Jareth nodded. "And I'll rally the goblin army and take care of the fireys."

"How's the baby's relative?" Sarah asked as she took one last deep breath and stood straight on her own power.

"Use your ring." Jareth touched a white fluffy kerchief to his sticky forehead.

"What?" Sarah held up her left hand where Jareth's engagement ring claimed her third finger. "This?"

"Yes," he stowed the kerchief in his pocket. "That's a real crystal, you know."

"Oh!" Immediately, Sarah focused on the one seeking the baby. "It's really small." She squinted at the tiny image. "It looks like they're fighting your fluffy thing."

"Good." The Goblin King brushed off his clothes and turned to go back into the castle. "They'll be fine."

"What are you talking about?" Sarah hurried after him.

"Oh, fluffy's just playing with them. There's nothing to worry about."

The Goblin Queen stared at him as they climbed the stairs to their bedrooms.

"Now," Jareth turned to his wife, "I suggest you change into something more comfortable. Niether one of us has the strength to vanish you and your mother back to the castle. You'll have quite a journey ahead of you." His eyes lingered on her face.

_So much for my wedding day._ Sarah thought to herself. She swallowed her tears, nodded at her husband, and went into her bedroom to change into jeans and a T-shirt before going to find her mother.

Jareth, meanwhile, used a little more of his minimal remaining magic to vanish himself into the city wearing his armored burgundy jacket, burgundy pants, cream low V-neck shirt, black gloves, and black boots. "You there!" He shouted at the nearest goblin. "Gather the troops! I want everyone at attention here in this square in five minutes!"

"Yes, sire!" The three-foot-tall goblin marched up to the nearest goblin and began to spread the word.

The Goblin King paced back and forth along the edge of the square, waiting for his army to arrive.

***

Linda was wandering around some brick walls when Sarah appeared in front of her. "Sarah! Oh my baby!" She embraced her daughter tightly.

"Ahk!" Sarah hugged her mother back briefly and then struggled to free herself. "Can't breathe!"

"Oh, honey, I'm so, so, sorry!" Linda stood back and gripped Sarah's arms as the tears rolled down her cheeks. "I didn't mean for it to happen!"

"Didn't mean for what to happen?" Sarah took her mother's elbows and gently, but firmly detached herself from the older woman. "Let's walk and talk at the same time, alright?" She tried to see over the walls at the castle beyond the goblin city, but the bricks towered too high above her head. "I think it's this way," she murmured as she chose a direction.

"I was just so stressed out at the time, and you were crying so loud, and your father wasn't being any help to me at all," Linda babbled as they went, "and I just made up a story to tell you on the spot, and it happened to be about goblins,"

Sarah stopped walking and turned very slowly to face her mother.

"and then he showed up and you were gone and I had to try to find the castle beyond the goblin city in the middle of the Labyrinth," Linda paused to take a deep breath, "but then his goblins came and found me and brought me to the castle and he gave you back to me and sent me home and I thought it was all just a crazy dream." She wiped her eyes, having finished with her tears. "And now," she sniffled, "I find out that he thinks he's been in love with you all along and he's got you and everyone else under a spell to make us all think that there's nothing wrong with any of this, and it's all my fault!"

"Wait," Sarah could feel her mind spinning, "let me get this straight." She stared into her mother's red-rimmed eyes. "You wished me away?"


	22. Chapter 22

**Chapter Twenty-Two: Family Drama**

"Oh, Sarah, please don't be upset! I didn't mean it!"

The Goblin Queen took a step back, straightened her back, and crossed her arms over her chest. "Then you shouldn't have wished for it." The words left her mouth before she could stop them.

"Well, I'm sorry!" Her mother bitterly retorted. "If I'd known he was really going to come and take you away I would never have even told you the stupid story!"

Sarah sighed and shook her head, remembering her own experience wishing Toby away. "Mom, it doesn't matter." She started walking in the direction she hoped would bring them closer to the castle. "Let's just keep moving."

"And go where?" Her mother demanded erratically, walking beside her.

"Back to the castle," Sarah answered with a sigh.

"No!" Linda grabbed Sarah by the shoulders and spun her around.

"Ow!"

"Sarah, you listen to me!" She shook her daughter as if rattling her brain against her skull would make her see sense. "Jareth does not love you! And you do not love him! He is evil and he has you under a spell!"

Sarah stared at the woman before her, at the familiar dark curly hair and gray eyes, and at the unfamiliar glow of terror that surrounded her entire face. "How...can you...say that?" Even to herself, her voice sounded small and insignificant.

"Because he said that when he held you in his arms as a baby," Linda paused to force her tears back down her throat, "he knew that you would grow into a beautiful woman and that he would want to marry you. So he brought me to the castle to take you back to Earth so I could raise you properly. Don't you see? He's had you under a spell since you were a baby!"

Sarah yanked herself away and turned her back on her mother, mind scrambling for pieces that would make sense. Their encounter with the Lady of Night flashed behind her eyes, and Sarah's desperate crawl to reach her beloved Jareth through her torturous nightmare. _How could a spell do that?_ Then she remembered her conversation with the Labyrinth and her promise that her first child would become the guardian of the Labyrinth. _The Labyrinth works by love, sometimes a cruel love, but still love nevertheless. It would never have talked to me like that if there wasn't real love in my heart._ She pressed her lips together and shook her head from side to side slowly, carefully removing every shred of doubt before she turned back to face her mother again.

"You know," Sarah said quietly, face tense and stiff, "Jareth used to try to tell me what was in my heart, and then it almost got us both killed." She shuddered at the memory of sharp-toothed spider that had nearly caused both their deaths. "And then he stopped trying to tell me what I was feeling and just let me figure it out on my own. That was when I realized how much I love him." She took a slow breath before going on, "and you have no right to try to do the same thing to me. You don't know what's in my heart or how it got there or why it's there or anything." Sarah took a mighty step forward, feeling tall and empowered, "I know what's in my heart, and I love the Goblin King. So you are just going to have to deal with it."

"Oh," her mother sobbed, "look what he's done to you!"

"Look what he's done to me?" Sarah shouted. "Look what he's DONE to me! I'm sorry I'm not the wimpy little girl I was before you walked out on us! I'm sorry I don't cowtow to your every whim and desire, and I'm sorry I don't measure up your expectations! Living here in this Labyrinth has done spectacular things for me. I don't whine about life being unfair anymore. I don't try to fix problems by running up to my room and crying into my pillows. I. Have. a. spine. Forgive me for making use of it!" With that, she turned again and marched down the corridor, tears pricking the corners of her eyes.

"Sarah..." Linda followed her daughter, keeping up as best she could. "I had no idea you felt that way."

"What way?" Sarah retorted.

"You think I walked out on you?"

The Goblin Queen paused long enough to glare at her mother. "What else do you call it when you wake up one morning to your father staring out the window and your mother's car no longer in the driveway and no one knows where she is or if she's coming back. Ever." She returned to her march.

"Sarah!" Linda trotted beside her again. "You're not being fair! The whole situation was so much more complicated than that!"

"Fair!" Sarah whirled on her mother then. "You want to talk about fair? Alright, how's this for fair? I fall in love with the most wonderful man I have ever met in my life, and on the day of my wedding, my mother who tries so hard to be so accepting of everyone and everything turns on me and says it's impossible for my love to be real because the man I just MARRIED happens to be the Goblin King! Then, instead of trying to talk me to about it and make sense out of the whole situation, she runs off into the Labyrinth, where she could get herself killed if she's not careful! Oh, and by the way," Sarah's tone lessened so that she was no longer screaming at the top of her lungs, but her words were still just as severe, "Jareth and I have a limited amount of power here, and it took most of it bring you all here for the ceremony, and the rest of it to send you all home, so now you and I are stuck walking around in the Labyrinth until we find our way back to the castle or something jumps out of the walls and eats us alive! AND!" She stuck her pointer finger in her mother's face as she made her final points, "some idiot decided that the exact moment I was walking down the aisle would be a good time to wish their baby away only neither Jareth nor I can take care of the baby or even keep an eye on the relative because Jareth has to keep the goblin city from being torn apart by fireys and I'm stuck babysitting you! THIS WAS SUPPOSED TO BE MY WEDDING DAY!"

"Sarah, I-"

"Shut up!" The Goblin Queen began walking again. "and come on."

Linda followed obediently.


	23. Chapter 23

_Author's Note: Right, so, only one chapter tonight, even though I promised two. Sorry about that. I had some meetings this evening for my job that went later than I had thought they would and then I had writer's block like no other. Anyway, here it is:_

_*****************************************************************_

**Chapter Twenty-Three: Clever Kelly**

"Alright!" The Goblin King paced before the neat rows of his assembled troops. "You've all been divided into four groups." He paused and surveyed the varied heights of his goblin soldiers. "Each group will take a different part of the city." A brief mental count left him with a grand total of ten lizard-knights and thirty foot soldiers. "You know your assignments." He held up his staff and gave the command, "move out!"

The goblins immediately attempted to run in every direction at once and promptly crashed into each other, tripped over each other, and started throwing punches at the stupid goblin who'd just knocked them down.

Jareth covered his face with one hand, resting the other on his staff.

"Hey!" A small, girlish voice shouted from down the street. "You!" A large gray-furred, six-legged creature with a black face and a mouth shaped like a plunger barreled right up to the Goblin King and gave him an enormous suction-cup kiss. "Give me back my brother!" The tiny blond girl punched Jareth in the arm.

"Fluffy! Down!" Jareth scolded the large monster, which obediently plopped down before him. "You'll have to excuse me," he said to the girl as he wiped sticky spittle from his forehead. "I'm afraid I've got a bit of a crisis on my hands right now."

"What about my brother?" She demanded, grabbing his elbow when he tried to walk away.

The Goblin King turned and stared down at her deep brown eyes with his own mismatched glare, "your brother is safe and will remain so for as long as I please. If you'll just be patient while I stop my city being destroyed by fireys, then we can get on with the business of the baby you wished me to take away."

The girl swallowed and glanced around her at the chaos of goblin soldiers and dashing red blurs. "If I help you with these fireys," she asked slowly, "will you give me back my baby brother?"

Jareth glanced behind him at the sound of a crash and he and the girl watched a chicken-legged red ball of fur leaped out of the rubble of a fallen wall and threw its arm at a passing lizard-knight. "And just how do you propose to immobilize them?"

"I have an idea." She crossed her arms and refused to move her feet. "But I'm not going to try anything until I have your word you'll give me back my brother."

The Goblin King faced her again and winced as the entire roof of a building behind her was removed and thrown to the ground by a pair of industrious fireys. "Very well." He sighed. "You have my word that I will offer your baby brother back to you if you can get the fireys out of the goblin city."

"Great!" The girl skipped over to the large gray creature known as Fluffy. "Hey boy!" She clapped excitedly and the monster got up, jumped, and wheezed out a whistle-like yelp. "Come here! Come on!" She jogged over to a goblin who was wrestling with a fuzzy red arm. "Here, boy!" She snatched the arm and yanked it off the goblin, holding it out to Fluffy. "Smell this? Got the scent?" She whipped the arm back and forth a little bit, watching the creature jump after it and take in big gulps of it with its suction cup mouth. "Go get it, boy! Go get it!"

Just then, a bright red firey flipped head over heels across the square, leaped on Fluffy's back, crowed at the sky, and leaped on down a side alley. Fluffy roared and loped after the firey. The blond girl smacked the bright red arm that tried to grab hold of her ear. "Stop it!" She commanded. The arm hung sullenly in her hand.

The Goblin King smirked at her from across the square.

***

"Sarah?" Linda quietly broke the heavy silence after her daughter seemed to have calmed down.

The Goblin Queen took a deep breath. "Yes?" She sounded almost friendly.

"How well do you know the Labyrinth?"

Sarah shot her mother a glare. "Well enough."

"Oh." Linda averted her eyes to the ground. "Okay."

"Sarah!" A gruff voice called in the distance. "Sarah!"

"Hoggle!" Sarah's heart jumped with elation. "Hoggle!" She shouted as loud as she could. "I'm here, Hoggle!"

"Sarah!" His answering shout was filled with just as much excitement.

"Hoggle!"

"Who's Hoggle?" Linda followed Sarah as she turned a corner.

"He's a friend of mine." All of the anger from Sarah's earlier explosion had drained out of her voice.

"Sarah!" The dwarf threw himself at his friend in a fierce hug. "I've been looking everywhere for you! The castle's this way!"


	24. Chapter 24

_Author's note: Sorry for the wait on the chapters again! I've discovered that working on things involving lots of words in front of a computer screen all day does not leave much verbal brain power left after dinner. However, I have finished my second Labyrinth music video! You should check it out: .com/watch?v=SA5Blb_N3lM In the meantime, here is the next chapter - enjoy!  
_

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**Chapter Twenty-Four: Almost Resolved**

Fluffy wheezed a triumphant suction-cup yelp as he dropped the last twitching leg onto the pile of groaning bright red fur. "There!" Kelly announced, hands on hips as she smirked at the Goblin King. "Now give Sam back!"

Jareth grinned as he sauntered around the edge of the pile. "You have immobilized them, he admitted, but you haven't removed them from the city." He stood back and crossed his arms over his chest.

Kelly glared at him with her dark brown eyes and then frowned at the pile of firey pieces before her. "I need a tarp." She looked back up at the Goblin King. "A big tarp."

Jareth shrugged and snapped his fingers. Immediately, an enormous black tarp appeared, covering the entire pile of fireys to some mild protesting of the heads that were still conscious. Kelly grinned up at Fluffy.

***

"So, you're Sarah's mother?" Hoggle asked of Linda as he led the way through the corridors of brick walls.

"Hm? Oh, yes." Linda's brow creased. "How did you know?"

Hoggle smirked to himself. "You look like her. How else?"

"Oh." Linda glanced over her shoulder to her daughter, who was following several steps behind them.

"Erm, if I may ask," Hoggle went on a little sheepishly, "what kind of a fight was it?"

"What fight?" Sarah and Linda asked at the same time.

Sarah scowled at her mother and then directed her attention at her feet.

"A bad one, then," Hoggle muttered to himself.

Linda and Sarah humphed in unison.

***

The little blond girl stood before the Goblin King, eyes narrowed, arms crossed, feet planted. "Well?"

Jareth looked down at her apathetically. "Well what?"

"Our deal." Kelly stuck out her hands, palms up. "Give me back my brother."

"Yes," he crossed his arms over his chest and leaned back impassively, "I did say I'd offer him back to you, didn't I?" A crafty smirk touched his lips. "He's currently in my castle. I'll meet you there."

"What? That's not fair!" Kelly stamped her foot and shouted at the empty space in front of her where the Goblin King had just been standing. "Hoggle?" She looked around and shouted his name a few more times. "Where did that stubborn dwarf get to anyway?" She muttered as she trudged on toward the castle.

***

"You know," Hoggle announced clearly as they neared the goblin city, "It's none of my business and I know that, but it just seems to me that fights in families ought to get made up as fast as possible. Otherwise, it just goes on forever and then your family's not your family anymore. Ah, here we are!" He marched through the open gates into the city where some of the goblin citizens had begun to clean up the mess the fireys had left behind.

Sarah and Linda paused just before the gate. Behind them, a giant furry creature with a mouth like a plunger roared past them, making wheezing roaring sounds at a bright red screaming head that had been attached to a stick and dangled just in front of the monster's face.

"Oh." The Goblin Queen murmured, "I guess that solves one of our problems."

"I'm not going to ask." Linda shook her head and then looked her daughter in the eye. "I'm sorry, Sarah."

"What for?" Sarah crossed her arms and listened.

Linda sighed, resisting the temptation to roll her eyes. "I'm sorry that I let my past experience cloud my judgment, and I'm sorry that I didn't rely on what I know about you to help me understand the situation. You are a strong-willed, intelligent, independent young woman. I'm sorry I missed out on watching you grow up. I really am. I wish I had stayed more involved in your life."

"And what about Jareth?" Sarah demanded as patiently and calmly as she could manage.

"Sarah, he stole you away from me and made me go through that horrible Labyrinth!"

The Goblin Queen closed her eyes and took a very deep breath. "Alright, I'm going to explain to you how the Labyrinth works. When a human wishes for the Goblin King to take a baby away, whether they mean it or not, the goblins rush off to take the baby away. It's just wired into their brains somehow. Believe me, I've tried to stop them. It's not possible. Jareth goes after them to give the human a chance to get their baby back so that he isn't stuck babysitting too long. Now, the Labyrinth has rules, and rule number one is that wishes are binding. Rule number two is that love is always strongest. So, Jareth gives the human a chance to prove that their love for the baby is stronger than their wish for him to take the baby away by sending the human through the Labyrinth. Trust me, if he could just send every baby back to where it came from as fast as it got here, he would! It's not like he likes having babies around all the time."

"No, Sarah, you should have heard the way he talked about you!" Linda took a step forward, motioning vaguely with her hands. "He's been stalking you for your whole life because I made that stupid wish!"

"Okay," Sarah held up her hands to silence her mother. "First of all, none of this is your fault. Second of all," she took a deep breath, "you're not the only one who's wished a baby away."

Linda stared blankly at Sarah for a few seconds as she absorbed this new information. "Toby?"

Sarah nodded. "Even if you hadn't wished me away, I still would have met Jareth, and he still would have fallen in love with me, and I still would have fallen in love with him." She glanced at the city and started walking toward it as she continued. "Come on, I'll tell you the whole thing."


	25. Chapter 25

_Author's Note: Sorry about the wait again. Life just keeps doing the busy thing, ya know? Anyway, I had a little trouble with the ending of this chapter, since it had to be done rather delicately. And don't let the title fool you. I'm not done yet. :P I'm just trying to decide if I want to continue on this story or break off and start another sequel, but we'll see. So, read, comment, and let me know what you think! Thanks for reading!!!_

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**Chapter Twenty-Five: The End**

"Stupid Goblin King," Kelly muttered to herself as she stomped up the stairs of the castle, and came to the top of the final stair, "stupid – Sam!" She leaped across the small space and smashed her forehead into something hard and cold. "Ow! What...?" Her fingertips reached out and grazed the face of a mirror. "Oh, no." Sam's reflection smiled at her, gurgled, and crawled away. "No! Sam!"

Jareth's laughter echoed throughout the room. "You don't have much time left." His grinning image stepped into view on five mirrors surrounding Kelly. "You'd better hurry."

Kelly growled and started forward in a different direction from before, arms held out in front of her. "Sam!" She called as she stumbled through the maze of mirrors. "Sam! Where are you? Sam!"

The Goblin King leaned against a wall in a corner, watching Sam crawl around in circles a few feet away from him. His eyelids felt heavier than ever, his body weighted and so tied to the physical space around him he doubted he'd be able to vanish anywhere anytime soon. Kelly's progress would have been more amusing if he'd been more awake or had more energy. As it was, the whole thing just tired him.

The sound of shattering glass broke through Jareth's half-asleep trance. He stood up straight, no longer leaning against the wall and watched as Kelly broke through one of the mirrors to get at her baby brother, who was sitting near Jareth's feet, safely away from the shards of glass.

"That was awfully reckless of you," the Goblin King commented.

"Sam!" Kelly breathed a sigh of relief as she scooped the baby up into her arms.

Jareth allowed himself the smallest of smiles as he sent the two of them home. Then he turned wearily to the entrance around the corner and shuffled down the stairs to the throne room, half-leaning on the wall as he went.

Just as he reached his golden throne, Sarah and Linda trudge up into the room with Hoggle close behind.

"Sarah!"

"Jareth!"

Linda watched the newlyweds embrace and sighed.

"You look so tired!" Sarah whispered to her husband, running a finger over the dark rings under his eyes.

"I feel tired." Jareth answered, taking her hands and kissing each palm. "I'm so glad you're safe."

The Goblin Queen smiled. "And old friend helped us find our way." She glanced down at Hoggle, who waved at the Goblin King.

"Then he should have a place of honor at the dinner table tonight, but first," he pulled away from his wife and looked over at Linda, "we must see about sending your mother home."

"Wait," Linda took a step forward, "um, Jareth, I wanted to apologize. I overreacted earlier. You clearly do love Sarah, and she loves you, and I wish you all the best." She smiled and shrugged.

Sarah crossed the distance between them in two large steps and embraced her mother. "Thank you," she whispered.

"I love you, sweetheart." Linda whispered back.

"I love you, too, mom."

"You'll keep calling me, won't you?" Linda asked when Sarah started to back up toward Jareth.

"Every chance I get." Sarah promised, releasing her mother's hands and taking hold of one of Jareth's hands instead.

"Well," Linda took a deep breath. "I guess that's it then."

Jareth nodded. "Visualize your home, and the exact room you want to end up in."

Linda closed her eyes and Jareth and Sarah concentrated, yanking the magic up out of their bones. It was just barely enough. When Linda was gone and Hoggle had quietly removed himself from the room, Jareth took his wife's chin between his finger and thumb, tilting her face up toward his. He kissed her gently, but thoroughly.

"I'm sorry." He said when the kiss was done.

"What for?" Sarah stared up at him dazedly, fighting dizziness.

"Today was supposed to be perfect." He frowned. "I'm afraid everything seems to have gone completely wrong."

Sarah smiled and wrapped her arms around his waist, leaning her cheek against his chest, hearing and feeling the beat of his heart. "Not everything." Her anger and frustration melted completely away, leaving behind them only a deep sense of peace.

Jareth's brow wrinkled. "You must be more tired than I thought."

"Probably." Sarah nodded into his shirt.

"Aren't you going to yell at me or throw something?"

She giggled the way women do when they are exhausted. "I did that already."

"Oh." He paused. "When?"

Sarah sighed. "When I found my mother. We had a fight. Hoggle helped us make up. I told her about Toby and how we met."

"Ah." A question formed at the tip of Jareth's mouth, but some odd fear kept him from voicing it.

"Did you really hold me when I was a baby?" Sarah asked sleepily.

Jareth winced. "Well..."

"Because that would explain why you always looked so familiar," she went on, swaying gently side to side, "and why I feel so safe with you all the time. Even when I was mad at you and hated you, I always felt safe."

Jareth smiled and let out the breath he hadn't realized he'd been holding. "My Sarah..."

"Mmm?"

"I think we should take a nap before dinner."

"Mmhmm."

They stumbled up the stairs to their separate rooms, and of course dinner came much too soon. Sarah rushed to put on the dress she'd picked out for dinner and the ball to come afterward, nearly stabbing herself in the eye with her make up as she hurried to make herself ready. She yanked her hair back into a pony tail high on the back of her head and still managed to look like it had taken hours to make it look so perfect. Smiling to herself and her reflection, clad in a long blue fluffy ball gown with blue studded flats, she yanked the door to her bedroom open and found herself staring up at the Goblin King, he hand poised to knock. His dinner jacket matched her dress perfectly, and his bright smile sent her heart flying.

Dinner passed in a blurred flurry of conversation, joking, laughter, and celebration. The goblins were happy, Jareth was happy, Sarah was happy, and as far as anyone could tell, even the Labyrinth itself was happy.

The ball was more of a blur in Sarah's memory than dinner. The only thing that stood out to her was the smile that never left Jareth's face, and how much more alive he seemed to her than he had ever been before. She was surprised at the electricity that seemed to be flowing through her own limbs as well. All of the activity of the day should have left her completely exhausted, but somehow her body had found an extra store of energy just for that evening.

They danced together until their feet carried them out to the peach trees, where they kissed and held each other under the stars until everyone else had left. Then they returned into the castle and shared their first night together.


	26. Chapter 26

**Chapter Twenty-Six: The Beginning**

Time is a funny thing. It slows down when we wish it would speed up and speeds up when we wish it would slow down, but the best thing about time is that it never stops moving forward.

***

"Hoggle!" The boy called into the dark, tufts of dark brown hair sticking up around his head while longer strands dangled around his chin and shoulders. "Hoooooggle!" He squinted his mis-matched, gray and brown eyes into the black shadows between the trees. "Hoggle?" His pointed eyebrows lifted at the sound of shifting bushes. "Hoggle?" He braced one hand against the nearest tree and gulped down the lump in his throat.

"Prince Robert!" A small wad of orange and white fur exploded out of the shadows and soared over the boy's head. "What are thee doing at this time of night?"

Robert stopped screaming, uncovered his head, and straightened up, brushing off his black frock cloak, which hung loosely over a white silk tunic and sturdy tan breeches. He cleared his throat and spoke as regally as a 12-year-old boy can speak, "I have decided to leave the Labyrinth."

The fox knight gasped. "But, my prince! What of thine parents?"

"Ha!" Robert barked, "them? They don't know I'm gone. And they won't," he jabbed a finger at the small creature, "will they?"

"Erm," the little orange animal made a timid suggestion, "won't they notice thine empty room in the morning?"

Robert pouted and turned away from the fox knight, his shiny heavy boots tramping on through the forest, "I don't care if they know I'm gone. The point is, I'm leaving."

"May I ask why?" Sir Didymus followed the Goblin Prince, hopping and running through the undergrowth.

"Sure," Robert sneered. "You can always ask anything."

"Then, why are thou leaving the Labyrinth?"

"Because there's more to life than secrets and tricks and mazes and goblins and babies and even magic. I'm tired of all this. It's boring. I've solved the Labyrinth like a hundred times all by myself. I've seen everything there is to see here. I want something new. Something different. I want to explore where Mom came from."

"Has thou asked thine parents?" Sir Didymus huffed at Robert's kneecaps.

"Yes." The boy answered in an exasperated tone as his lean frame continued to move fluidly amongst the shadows. "They said I couldn't go for more than a week at a time, and I could only visit once a year. It's not fair, Didymus. I want more than just this big stupid Labyrinth."

A dull tremor shook the ground beneath them. "Be careful with thine words, my prince." Sir Didymus warned, "the Labyrinth is anything but stupid."

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_Author's note: And thus begins the next installment! I expect this to be the last one (trilogies are nicely rounded things), but then again, I also expected the first eight chapters of "The Walls Crumble and Fall" to be the only one. (shrug) eh, we'll see what happens. Anyhow, the next one will be called "The Voice and the Lady", and it's coming soon, so keep your eyes open!_

_PS – sorry this was so long in coming. Expect further delays. I'm in the process of doing paperwork and getting set up at a new job and while I'm still getting sorted out, it's going to be especially hard to find time to write, but I promise to do my best. ^_~_


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